Living our values

Sustainability report

Annualised data in this report refers to the period April 2007 — March 2008. The commentary covers activity up to November 2008. All new performance targets are set for completion by June 2009 unless other timescales are specified.

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IntroductionContents

Introduction4 The long view5 Sustainability vision

Editorial7 Sustainability strategy9 Observer sustainability coverage10 Leading liberal voice11 Quality of journalism12 Reader survey13 Readers’ editors13 Political affiliation14 Social justice, Katine

Commercial17 Sustainability strategy19 Advertising20 Commercial realities

People22 Reorganisation for the digital age23 Union responses24 Staff survey26 Diversity

Operations29 Environmentally regenerative31 Newspaper production34 Offices

Communities38 King’s Cross41 Scott Trust Foundation

Auditors’ report42 The findings

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1621

28

3742

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As a multimedia company we thrive on interaction and our website has become a focal point for debate about everything from politics to sport. So it is increasingly out of kilter that our main means of engagement with our stakeholders is through a static annual sustainability report.

In light of this, we plan to move the thrust of our social, ethical and environmental reporting to guardian.co.uk by summer 2009.

We will still produce a printed report, a shortened summary of the year’s performance and future plans, with links to detailed information on the web. From 2009, the publication of this summary report will be brought forward from autumn to summer, to bring it into line with the financial and sustainability accounting of our parent company Guardian Media Group.

By using the web more proactively, we hope to create a more dynamic interaction with

stakeholders, including regular updates and case studies that explore the social, ethical and environmental issues and dilemmas that GNM faces. We plan not only to share the disappointments and successes of our own journey, which may inspire others to action, but also to gain ideas and expertise from our vast pool of users around the world, of how to make our business more sustainable.

In the new lexicon of the web, this is known as “crowdsourcing”, an activity we have already applied successfully, to gain expert advice and opinion to support our three-year Katine development project in Uganda. (see page 14 and guardian.co.uk/katine).

We also hope the new site will increase our stakeholders’ awareness of our sustainability reporting, given that our annual readers’ survey showed that slightly less than a fifth of our readers and web users know about the sustainability report.

One of the key reasons behind the reports is our desire to build trust in the media by becoming increasingly transparent about the decisions we reach and the way we implement them in both our editorial and commercial operations. After all, these are the same standards we expect from the individuals, businessmen and politicians we report on.

This is also in tune with our readers and web users, with our latest annual readers’ survey showing that more than nine out of 10 believe it is important for GNM to be open in the way we make editorial decisions and operate as a business.

Until the new web reporting is up and running, our managing director still values feedback via good old-fashioned email.

Email feedback to tim.brooks@guardian.co.uk

Living our values going online and interactive

→

The team

Journalists who focus on sustainability Ian Katz deputy editor, Mon-Fri, Damian Carrington head of environment, John Vidal environment editor, David Adam environment correspondent, Juliette Jowit environment correspondent, Alok Jha green technology correspondent, George Monbiot environment comment page columnist, Ian Sample science correspondent, James Randerson science correspondent, Felicity Lawrence investigations writer, Larry Elliott economics editor, Ashley Seager economics correspondent, Terry Macalister industrial correspondent, Leo Hickman ethical living correspondent, Jessica Aldred acting deputy environment site editor, Felicity Carus environment site subeditor, Dan Milmo transport correspondent, Bibi van der Zee environmental and ethical living writer, Robin McKie science editor, Lucy Siegle ethical living correspondent, Alison Benjamin Society editor

Other staff whose job is integral to implementing GNM’s sustainability visionDerek Gannon chief operating officer / sustainability board champion, Jo Confino head of sustainable development, Emma Wright sustainability manager, Hannah Judge-Brown sustainable development coordinator, Claire Buckley environmental manager, Tanya Cordrey Guardian environment site general manager, Carrina Gaffney commercial sustainable development manager, Patricia Corcoran diversity consultant, Kai Muxlow sustainability advocate, print, distribution and sales, Darren Gavigan sustainability advocate, Creative, Monique Argus sustainability advocate, Guardian Professional, Elisabeth Ribbans sustainability advocate, Guardian editorial, James Hodge sustainability advocate, Observer editorial, Victoria Bentley sustainability advocate, HR, Paul Jenkins sustainability advocate, Guardian Professional, Hugh MacDermott sustainability advocate, technology, Daniel Blaney sustainability advocate, Finance

For details on the governance of our sustainability strategy see guardian.co.uk/sustainability

Guardian News & Media is committed to leading the way on sustainability issues within the media industry

Editors Jo Confino, Emma Wright Art director Gavin Brammall Design Sian Everett, Emma Tracey Picture editor Rachel Vere Graphics Mark McCormick Production Steve Coady Front cover and other Illustrations Noma Bar

EditorialLeading liberal voice

The long view...

G NM’s ownership structure is unique, and gives us the opportunity to develop differently from publicly quoted media companies. The mission of our sole

shareholder is to nurture high-quality independent liberal journalism by sustaining the Guardian, rather than seeking to maximise financial returns. The company is values-driven, not profits-driven.

Accordingly, we are able and indeed required to take the long view, and to challenge ourselves and our vision of the future. This is exemplified in our stated ambition to be “the world’s leading liberal voice”. This started as the editor in chief’s vision, but is now the company’s mantra, and our guide as we plot our course. The creation of Guardian America, and the engagement of a full team of US journalists (see page 10) over the past year to better serve our millions of US users, was an important step on this journey.

Our record audiences — with more than a million people now visiting our website on busy news days — shows how that bold vision is slowly beginning to be realised.

We have taken the same approach with sustainability. During this past year we debated and agreed our ambition to be “environmentally regenerative” and to investigate how we can become carbon positive — to go beyond carbon neutral and positively affect climate change. To some ears this will sound as overambitious as our editorial ambition does: derisible even. For the company, however, it is an energising challenge. What will it take to achieve this? How will we get there? We believe that setting such formidable goals unlocks the creativity, imagination and can-do attitude that has been GNM’s particular ethos ever since our great former editor CP Scott, on the paper’s centenary in 1921, wrote that “nothing should satisfy short of the best, and the best must always seem a little ahead of the actual.”

We can’t be the best in this sphere if we aim only for carbon neutrality: many companies are doing that, and often in the easiest possible way, merely by seeking to spend their way to neutrality through offsetting their emissions. We want our own sustainability work to be deeper, more

durable, and more testing to our staff and other stakeholders.

Our sustainability vision (see opposite) goes beyond our offices and print sites to embrace editorial, commercial and community activity, as well as taking our supply chain into account. It also goes beyond climate change, which critical as it is, tends to dominate the debate around sustainability, thereby edging out other enormous inter-connected challenges facing our society and planet such as poverty and deforestation.

We are pleased to report that we have made significant progress over the past year, helped by a step change in the engagement of senior directors, who from 2009 will incorporate sustainability targets into their personal objectives.

In editorial, a major shift has been the integration of all journalists from the Guardian, Observer and guardian.co.uk who write about sustainability into one strategic “pod” led by one of the Guardian’s deputy editors. This has been supported by the board’s commitment to invest in the environment website with the aim of it becoming the best of its kind in the world (see page 7).

Alongside this, we have created the first commercial sustainability team in the media sector, reporting directly to the managing director (see page 17). This group is developing new business opportunities that align with our values, as well as exploring ways of dealing with the contradiction between our editorial desire to combat climate change and advertisers’ desire for us to consume.

Another milestone has been our move to a new eco-office building in King’s Cross (see page 34). Not only did we choose the building because of its leading green credentials, but we have also ensured that sustainability has been at the heart of all aspects of our move. This ranges from making the multimillion-pound fit-out

carbon neutral, to choosing a caterer with strong ethical and environmental credentials (see page 36).

Despite our progress so far, we foresee a complex journey ahead with few simple solutions. That is why, alongside all the other sustainability-related appointments, we have employed an environmental manager with the expertise to create a system to monitor and improve our operational performance, and set targets for decreasing our carbon footprint (see page 29).

CP Scott talked about the need for “honesty, cleanness [now interpreted as integrity], courage, fairness, a sense of duty to the reader and the community.” These are not mere words but a continuing call to action. In a booklet to all staff containing Scott’s centenary essay, Liz Forgan, chair of the Scott Trust, wrote: “These words, written nearly a century ago, still resonate

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IntroductionSustainability vision

This past year GNM has made significant progress towards achieving the sustainability goals it set itself. The move to Kings Place is just one of these

With great freedom comes great responsibility

The eco-office at King’s Cross Photo: David Levene

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IntroductionSustainability vision

O ur vision is to be the leader on sustainability within the media industry and to be environmentally regenerative in our activities. Through

our editorial coverage and business activities, we will demonstrate to readers, staff, advertisers, suppliers and our communities that GNM is committed to enhancing society’s ability to build a sustainable future.

Editorial Clearly our greatest impact comes from informing and influencing our global audience. We will therefore build on our position as a recognised leader in the reporting of environmental and social justice issues by providing the most comprehensive news coverage on subjects such as climate change, environmental degradation and social inequality. These topics will be explored from the social, economic, political and scientific perspectives, both nationally and globally.

We will promote public debate and harness the power of our readers and users by creating online tools and projects that give them the opportunity to share knowledge and ideas, as well as encouraging them to make a difference, both as individuals and within their communities.

Social justice has always been at the heart of our journalism and we will consistently give a voice to disadvantaged communities around the world most affected by climate change.

CommercialGNM’s reputation puts us in a strong position to benefit from the growing trend in businesses moving towards a more sustainable future. We will support our large existing clients in this endeavour as well as enable small and emerging companies to develop their markets.

We recognise that tensions can arise between our need for advertising revenues to sustain our business and being a medium for promoting consumption. Our

Sustainability vision

role is neither to hector our readers nor to censor on their behalf. Our editorial coverage informs and influences our audience in their choices.

We will work with our readers and users to gain a deeper understanding of what products and services they want in this area, and use this knowledge to engage with our advertisers and sponsors on the issue of sustainability.

OperationalOur ambition is to be environmentally regenerative. We will investigate how we can become carbon positive, to go beyond carbon neutral and positively affect climate change.

Our offices and print sites will be of the highest environmental standards and we commit to minimising waste and maximising both efficiency and recycling. We will avoid unnecessary energy use, reduce our energy consumption where possible, use renewables and only offset emissions where there are no real alternatives.

Sustainability will be at the heart of our procurement processes as we recognise that our suppliers represent a key part of our operational impact.

We will consistently increase the amount of recycled and certified virgin paper in our products and will work across the industry to minimise the ecological footprint of paper supply and newspaper distribution.

PeopleWe will empower and inspire everyone who works at GNM to act by encouraging sustainable behaviour. We will achieve this through leadership, raising awareness and incentives. By the time we move to our new offices in King’s Cross, our working culture will aim to minimise waste and we will make it easy for all of us to act responsibly. We will also work in partnership with our local and global communities to address their social and environmental needs, by highlighting the issues and providing volunteering, resources and funding.

with meaning. They articulate standards that everyone working for the company — not just journalists — is still expected to meet today.”

We recognise just how fortunate we are as a media company, with an editorial staff approaching 800, our editor in chief given the opportunity to develop the newspapers and website as he sees fit and operating in a society relatively free from political interference. With this great freedom, comes a great responsibility.

In the case of sustainability, our duty to the reader and community is clear. Our planet is heading for possible catastrophe, and as human beings as well as people who work for GNM, we want to do everything in our power to help avert it.

The eco-office at King’s Cross Photo: David Levene

For more information on the Scott Trust see gmgplc.co.uk/ScottTrust →

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EditorialOur greatest impact comes from informing and influencing our global audience. We will therefore build on our position as a recognised leader in the reporting of environmental and social justice issues

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EditorialSustainability strategy

A climate for changeBy championing environmental issues, Guardian News & Media has changed people’s attitudes and behaviour, and there are plans to do much more

We have this small window of opportunity to head off real disaster

B y far our biggest influence as a company is through our editorial coverage, though we also recognise the importance of practising what we preach (see operations, page 28).

Joint Guardian deputy editor, Ian Katz, who is in charge of the strategic direction of our environmental coverage across the Guardian, Observer and guardian.co.uk, makes our position clear: “Climate change is the pre-eminent challenge facing the world. We have this small window of opportunity to head off real disaster, so it is absolutely legitimate that we prioritise it. We have a duty to make people aware of the urgency of the problem and the inadequacy of the political and international response to it.

“It is also vital not to treat climate change narrowly but to understand its complexity, and that brings in other associated areas such as biodiversity and social justice.”

As well as raising awareness of the issues, our editorial teams are increasingly finding ways to connect our readers with channels for action through our environment website. A recent report by the Institute for Public Policy Research, Warm Words II, highlighted the media’s role in expanding the debate

and driving behavioural and attitudinal change, thereby giving confidence to government to take more radical steps. (The full report can be read at ippr.org.uk/publicationsandreports/)

In support of this, our annual readers’ survey (see page 8) shows unequivocally that our coverage of sustainability issues has led readers to change their behaviour.

And they want more. Nearly two-thirds of Guardian and Observer readers and more than half our website users say we could do more to encourage them to reduce their environmental footprint.

Our Scott Trust ownership gives us the ability to invest for the long term, even in an economic downturn. This has enabled us to transform the way we cover sustainability

issues in our newspapers and particularly online, where the stated aim is to create the world’s leading environment website.

In order to achieve this ambition, a number of significant developments are being implemented:• Ian Katz overseeing environmental coverage across all platforms. • Pooling all journalists across the Guardian, Observer and guardian.co.uk who write on sustainability into one team and employing more specialist correspondents in this field.• Agreement to launch specialist sections in both the Guardian and Observer newspapers to cover green issues.• Creating an environment network to provide an umbrella for the best websites across the globe.• Developing a quality database of information and statistics covering key aspects of climate change.• Expanding the role of George Monbiot, one of the most respected columnists writing about sustainability, to create video interviews with major figures.

“There is no other media organisation that can aim the same journalistic firepower at this issue,” says Katz. “Many UK or overseas media organisations are lucky to have more

Complex issues of climate change: China’s expanding industry Photo: Peter Parks/Getty Images

91% 8

6%

76% 6

8%

58% 54

%

84

%

75% 68

% 62%

49

%

49

%

75% 70%

57%

59%

47% 4

1%

SOURCE: GNM READER SURVEY 2008

How readers and users rate our sustainability coverage

% who responded good/excellent

Social justice Climate change Biodiversity &conservation

International development

Role of businessin society

Sustainabletravel

■The Guardian ■The Observer ■guardian.co.uk

SOURCE: GNM READER SURVEY 2008

Reader and user behaviour influenced by our coverage

% who responded some/strong influence

Energysaving

Recycling/reusing

Purchasing'green' alternatives

Purchasingfair trade

Consumingorganicfood

Reducing carjourneys

Ethicalinvestments

Reducingflights

Usingalternativeenergysources

Supportingan env. charity

80

% 76% 71%

76%

56%

47% 4

4% 36

% 33%

36%

72% 69

%

66

%

70%

54%

43% 39

% 34% 30

%

30%

54% 4

9%

46

%

48

% 40

% 32%

31% 25%

28% 24

%

■The Guardian ■The Observer ■guardian.co.uk

EditorialLeading liberal voice

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EditorialSustainability strategy

A duty to inform and educate

Alan Rusbridger, editor in chief of Guardian News & Media, on our coverage of the environment: “How we deal with the problem of climate change will be perhaps the most important story of the next generation. You cannot cover it from just London. It’s a tremendously complex global issue that requires a grasp of lots of discliplines, including economics and different kinds of science. There are not many news organisations that have the expert resources, the international spread and the will to cover it properly.

“The role of government is infinitely harder in this area unless you have an informed citizenry because politicians are not prepared to risk giving us unpopular and uncomfortable messages.

“At the same time there is a role for individuals to put pressure on governments because they sometimes find it more comfortable not to act decisively.

“One of the roles of the media is to boil down intensely complex subjects and make them comprehensible. If these issues are not aired and placed on the public agenda and debated with facts that are reliable, then it lets everyone off the hook.”

than one environment correspondent. Putting all our journalists in this area into a single pod operating in the middle of the newsroom means we have been able to pick up the metabolic rate of our environmental coverage, including a string of exclusive front page splashes.”

Our recent readers’ survey shows high levels of satisfaction with our coverage to date, with 86% of Guardian readers and nearly three-quarters of web users giving us good or excellent scores for our coverage of climate change. On other issues, such as biodiversity and international development, we also scored strongly (see graphic).

“We have absolutely led the way in areas like biofuels where a number of major stories have been reported exclusively in the Guardian and we have broken a number of significant green stories in areas such as the UK government’s energy strategy,” says Katz. “We have have been extremely effective at holding the government’s feet to the fire on its commitments on emissions reductions and renewable energy and have caught them a few times trying to wriggle out of those commitments.

“We are particularly pleased that we are also starting to break truly international

stories. For example, we got hold of a suppressed World Bank report estimating the rise in the cost of food associated with the rush to biofuels, which proved important in influencing the US debate on this issue.

“The area I am proudest of is the creation of an environment network. This is a recognition that it does not make sense for us to try to build everything ourselves, but it is much smarter to find the people who are doing good and clever things already and bring them under our umbrella.

“One example is our partnership with scidev.net which concentrates on technology and development issues. If you want to know, for example, what is going on in sub-Saharan Africa, that is the site to go to.

“We are working heavily in the clean-tech area, employing the media industry’s first clean-tech correspondent and have produced a special supplement profiling the 100 top firms operating in this area.

“Our plan is to establish the same pre-eminent position in clean-tech as we have in areas such as our coverage of the media sector. This is not just because there are some fascinating stories to tell but it is important because there is a need for both urgent technical innovation and investment

to tackle climate change. “If we have an aspiration to be the

best news source for environmental issues internationally we need to have correspondents based abroad. Despite the fact that our correspondents have had an international outlook, we can be a little parochial. Arguably what is happening in Brazil is more important than whether Europe reduces its emissions by 60% or 80% by 2050.

“The reason we have chosen to appoint an environment correspondent in the US and hopefully China is they are the two single most important pieces of the puzzle. The US is the world’s biggest polluter and China the fastest–growing polluter.

“To put this in perspective, China is adding 100 gigawatts of generating capacity over the next year, whereas in the UK our entire enerating capacity is around 70 gigawatts.

“We also plan to invest in reporting from countries such as Brazil, South Africa and Russia. This will be through a combination of developing our environment network and through the use of freelance writers.”

DAN

CH

UN

G

For more information see guardian.co.uk/environment →

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EditorialThe Observer

T he Observer has approached sustainability with renewed vigour and commitment over the past year. A casual glance at the increased volume of editorial on green issues

throughout the front section, the magazine and the comment section clearly illustrates that this is one of the topics at the very heart of the paper.

Alongside our journalism, the paper also spent many months organising a coming together of some of Britain’s most senior industrialists and business people to debate the role of commerce in environmentalism.

The discussions and heated debates which followed were partly captured in the paper when Sir David King, the former chief scientist, wrote passionately about how some members of the business community were setting examples that the political class would do well to follow. This helped destroy the myth that the environment and business are always at odds — and illuminated the many reasons why it is in their interests to lead the way on green issues.

In January 2008 the Observer began reporting on a theme we would return to throughout the year — how to feed the world in a sustainable way. In September, we splashed on the United Nation’s chief climate expert blaming meat eaters for many of the planet’s environmental woes, sparking a national debate on the issue.

Water is another scarce resource, and as we reported back in February 2008, bottled water has become the latest environmental battleground. Lucy Siegle, our ethical living correspondent, looked at the huge environmental costs of producing and shipping it, and reported on the growing movement returning to tap water.

In creating the space to debate environmentalism and sustainability, it is important that we allow ourselves to challenge orthodoxies and assumptions. It is important too that science and reason are brought to bear on an area that can be overshadowed by emotion and instinct.

An investigative piece on the “myth of food miles” vividly, and scientifically, illustrated how received wisdom can sometimes be no wisdom at all. Similarly, the plan to build 10 new green communities across the UK provoked fierce opposition, but strangely little scrutiny of their eco credentials. The Observer’s investigation revealed serious concerns about the proposals with some predicting that they will become the ‘eco slums’ of the future.

The ethics of fashion were next under the spotlight when an investigation by the Observer and BBC’s Panorama uncovered child labour working for Primark’s suppliers

in India. As a result, Primark sacked three clothing suppliers.

And Lucy Siegle, condemned our love affair with cheap fashion, which she said was becoming an eco disaster: “The bulk of discarded fast fashion is chucked into landfill. Meanwhile the fashion industry has been particularly adept at avoiding green censure and criticism,” she said.

But sustainability is not a subject confined to the news and comment pages of Britain’s oldest Sunday newspaper. All of our magazines take ethical and environmental issues seriously but cover them in entertaining ways, especially suited to weekend reading.

In January, Observer Magazine launched our third annual Ethical Awards with Lucy Siegle’s special report on ethical labelling and which ones you can really trust. More than 7,000 readers decided the winners in

10 categories, from ethical fashion to best DIY project, and their inspiring stories were reported in the June issue of the magazine. Our special ethical issue of the magazine also featured Dan McDougall’s report on the scandal of Egypt’s child cotton pickers, William Shaw’s experiment of living “off-grid” in a wooden chalet with his family for a month, and Eva Herzigova on how Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth made her a convert to ethical fashion.

The magazine’s Climate Change Special in March was edited by Radiohead’s Thom Yorke, who told readers how he had become involved with Friends of the Earth in 2003 and supported their Big Ask campaign to strengthen climate change laws. For the magazine he interviewed Ken Livingstone on his eco vision for London, and brought a green perspective to all the features, from restaurant reviews to motoring, interiors to gardening.

And as well as writing about gardens, the Observer Magazine team have rolled up their sleeves and completed another growing season on their organic allotment. They have strengthened ties with the local community and developed a strong relationship with the local Gospel Oak primary school’s gardening club.

Observer Food Monthly started the year with an issue celebrating the Top 40 eco foodies. At number one, was Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, for his campaign against battery-farmed chickens.

“We want to continue to exploring and promoting the pioneers and producers of sustainable food,” says editor Nicola Jeal.

Feed the world

There is a growing movement in

favour of returning

to tap water

The year has been marked with intelligent reporting and fierce debates

EditorialLeading liberal voice

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EditorialLeading liberal voice

Our global community

To report on the world we need to be out in the world, and GNM is expanding on an international scale like never before

I n a world of media conglomerates focused on the bottom line, brave, compassionate and radical journalism can sometimes get squeezed out. Yet it is exactly at this time of global uncertainty that

there is even more need for a well-resourced independent liberal voice.

We first witnessed this during the Iraq war when millions of people, particularly in America, flocked to our website because they perceived that their domestic media were doing little more than reflect the official US government line. They never left and over the past year we launched Guardian America, employing 15 US journalists to provide news and comment to users there. We have replaced the phrase “foreign news” with “international news” because millions of our readers are based outside the UK.

Alan Rusbridger, editor in chief of GNM, wrote in a report to staff: “In an era when many news organisations, particularly our main English-language competitors, are closing their foreign bureaux and effectively

retreating from the world, this is an opportunity for us.

“We can offer coverage that goes beyond the parochial and, in those places where the local media cannot be relied upon, reporting that is trustworthy and participative. In fact our future could come down to two words: world and community. That means being part of the world and reporting the world by being out in the world.”

Rusbridger plans to improve our coverage of sub-Saharan Africa and South America

where we are thin on the ground. China and India will also receive more editorial resource over time.

Another sign of our international expansion was the acquisition in July 2008 of a US digital news service ContentNext, the company’s first ever overseas acquisition. The following month GNM hired Caroline Little, previously CEO of Washington Post’s digital business, to be our special adviser on expansion in the US.

“We have come to realise that the nature of our engagement with the world has changed fundamentally,” says GNM managing director Tim Brooks. “We now have far more people reading our journalism outside the UK. We can ignore that or attempt to develop that and work with it.

“Ignoring it would be quixotic and I do not want to be remembered as the managing director that turned his back on the world. How you make a business out of it we don’t yet know. How do you find out? By putting down some roots.

“ContentNext is a small business employing only around 21 people. But for

We launched Guardian America, employing 15 journalists to provide news to users there

Map showing where our web users and journalistsare in the world

• Monthly visitors• Staff jounalists• Stringers/ regular freelancers

SOURCE (MONTHLY VISITORS): HBX, AUGUST 2008

Global presence

72

251,243Africa

301345

23,111,862Total

38,809

Users from other/unknown

175

1,509,279Asia

803,974Australia213,168

South America

615

8,399,605North America

257318

8,770,952UK

75

2,551,516Western Europe

2

573,316Eastern Europe

41

11

EditorialLeading liberal voice

the first time ever we own commercial operations in Los Angeles and New York. That is a big change and we hope to learn through that. Part of its appeal is that while it is a good business in its own right and we have shared values, they are plugged into the US media industry, an area where we have hopes to expand.”

The other major change over the past year has been the development of video and audio, to complement our existing strengths in text and pictures. This translated into a number of key awards that even a few years ago would have been unthinkable, including Guardian Films winning an International Emmy in New York and our weekly Islamophonic podcast scooping a Sony radio award.

Rusbridger says: “The transition we’re now making to a 24/7 multimedia news organisation is not about being all things to all people; it’s about offering our distinctively sharp, progressive journalism in ways that enable any one person to engage with us by the means that best reflects how they choose to consume, and react to, the news.”

T he web has radically transformed journalism, blurring traditional boundaries between text, pictures, audio and video.For newspapers, there

is a particular challenge given that daily deadlines have given way to an increasingly complex rolling programme of news updates in differing formats.

Liz Forgan, chair of the Scott Trust, says that it is exactly at times of great change that it is “especially important that some things stay the same.” The Scott Trust therefore asked Alan Rusbridger, editor in chief of GNM, to restate the trust’s values in the digital age. This was sent to all journalists.

He wrote: “The Scott Trust exists to preserve the Guardian and its journalistic traditions in perpetuity. It also has a declared purpose to promote freedom of the press and liberal journalism at home and abroad. CP Scott wanted the Guardian to be a liberal paper ‘worthy of its power and duty’. The character of Scott Trust journalism depends on its independence of ownership, behaviour and belief. Our journalists should be fierce in their protection of that independence.

“In the absence of a proprietor, our journalists’ main relationships are with our colleagues and with readers, viewers or listeners. There should be a high premium on transparency, collaboration and discussion.

“Scott Trust journalists need not share a narrow set of political beliefs but should be conscious of and share the trust’s general purpose and inheritance. At the same time, we should allow plurality of opinion, believing that diversity is good for the deliberative process of democracy. The papers should promote minority views as well as mainstream argument and should encourage dissent.

“All our journalists should operate to high ethical standards in searching for the unclouded face of truth, including the prompt admission of error. Editors should strive to differentiate factual reporting from commentary. Our journalists should argue the causes of free speech and freedom of information. We should behave fairly and allow our opponents a voice.”

These principles are the bedrock of our journalism but Rusbridger acknowledges that in the age of the internet, we need to be watchful that quality does not get sacrificed for speed. This is a difficult balancing act

because we are having to be many things to many people but with the same resources, in a declining newspaper market.

“There is a tension between the need for speed and producing journalism that we are proud of,” Rusbridger said. “Part of what readers want is a rapid delivery of information. But if we only did quick journalism and did not produce in-depth, contexualised journalism we would also be failing our readers.

“We must find ways of making sure staff do not drop dead from exhaustion or feel they are on a treadmill where they do not have the time and resource to think and find things out.”

The issue of the quality of journalism was raised in a recent book by Guardian investigative writer Nick Davies, Flat Earth News, which argues that the quality papers do not give their journalists the time to develop stories and accused them of “churnalism,” relying on copy from wire services and PR companies.

Davies, with the help of researchers from the journalism department of Cardiff University and the Guardian newsdesk, chose two random weeks and analysed every domestic news story from the Times, Guardian, Independent and Telegraph.

His study concluded that the papers were routinely recycling “unchecked second-hand material” from news agencies such as the Press Association or PR-driven copy.

The highest quota was in the Times at 69% with the Guardian lowest at around 50%.

Nick Hopkins, head of news at GNM, says the most important issue is that we are transparent about the sourcing of our stories. He says agencies such as Reuters and the Associated Press are highly respected and it is therefore absolutely right to be using their copy as our journalists cannot cover all stories.

“We have been reviewing our policy on this,” says Hopkins “and decided that if have added real value to a story, with for instance, additional comments and facts or specialist background information, then it can be published with a staff reporter’s byline. But if we are just replicating it, we should make clear it as coming from the agency.”

Rusbridger points our that “Nick’s book found the Guardian was least guilty. Without being complacent about it, that was an encouraging finding. But he identified a trend in journalism which is alarming and which we need to keep our eye on.”

Quality of journalism in the digital age

Branding used for US ElectionIllustration: Mick Marston

The rise of rapid news delivery has the potential to damage journalism. Print or online, GNM is striving to maintain its standards across all formats

SOURCE: GNM READER SURVEY 2008

Reader survey

Editorial content which GNM readers and users feel should be influenced by environmental and ethical concerns

The Guardian The Observer guardian.co.uk ■ Sometimes ■ AlwaysG O GU

89% 90%

27%

62%

Motoring30%

60%

29%

47%

76%

G O GU

38%

50%

88%

Travel38%

49%

87%

39%

36%

75%

43%

45%

88%

Food and drink41%

46%

87%

40%

32%

72%

41%

44%

85%

Life and style43%

40%

83%

42%

30%

72%

39%

43%

82%

Finance38%

40%

78%

33%

36%

69%

41%

41%

82%

Homes andgardens

44%

38%

82%

40%

28%

68%

33%

46%

79%

Beauty33%

46%

79%

31%

30%

61%

37%

41%

78%

34%

31%

65%

36%

43%

79%

Health36%

43%

79%

Fashion33%

29%

62%

37%

43%

80%

Readers and users who feel that GNM has prompted them to play a more active role in society

SOURCE: GNM READER SURVEY 2008

■The Guardian ■The Observer ■guardian.co.uk

Talked tofriends

Boycottedproducts

Signed apetition

Raised moneyfor charity

Written to politician

Campaignedon an issue

Been on ademonstration

Participatedin a blog

Volunteeredfor a charity

GNM hasn'tprompted me

More active role in society

81%

66

%

44

% 37% 29% 25%

24%

12%

12%

8%

74%

60

%

37% 29% 24

% 17% 14%

10% 7% 15%

61%

41%

29%

17%

15%

13%

13% 23% 7%

24%

EditorialLeading liberal voice

12

EditorialFeedback

Do we live up to our values?

A clear and open dialogue with our readers and web users means GNM can effect a positive influence on their lives

E ditor in chief Alan Rusbridger has made clear that “there should be a premium on transparency, collaboration and discussion” with our readers and web users.

We have many ways in which we fulfil this, primarily through our independent readers’ editors on both the Guardian and Observer (see opposite), our numerous blogs on guardian.co.uk as well as more traditional avenues such as readers’ letters.

To garner views on how we are living up to our values, with a particular emphasis on sustainability, we carry out an annual survey of around 3,500 readers and users.

Given the need for radical action to stem

the disastrous effects of climate change, inequality and the destruction of habitats, we are interested in tracking whether readers and users feel that our coverage has made any impact on their own behaviour.

The results continue to be encouraging among readers of the Guardian, with a significant rise over the past year among those who feel the paper has influenced them on a range of issues from energy saving and purchasing fair trade to reducing the number of car journeys and ethical

investments (see graphic, page 8).Conversely guardian.co.uk has seen a

reduced level of influence. We hope that the development of the environment website will improve these figures, given that one of the aims of the site is to give users the tools to be more proactive in this arena.

This dissonance between results from our readers and web users is consistent throughout the survey, which is not surprising given that our readers tend to have a longer, more loyal association with GNM.

This year we added a section which asked whether our audience think certain types of editorial content should be influenced by environmental and ethical concerns. While there was variance between readers and web users, there was a consensus across all three brands that we should tailor our content

in areas ranging from fashion, health and beauty to food, travel and motoring to reflect these concerns.

The survey continues to show that our coverage prompts our audience to be more active in society across a range of areas, most noticeably talking to friends about issues raised by our editorial, boycotting products and signing petitions.

Over the past year, there has been a seven percentage point rise in the number of Guardian readers boycotting products or brands and a five percentage point rise for those who have been prompted to write to a politician.

For full reader survey results see guardian.co.uk/sustainability →

Readers say they have reduced number of car journeys

13

EditorialFeedback

I t is now more than 10 years since the Guardian became the first UK paper to set up an independent ombudsman to deal with readers’ complaints. The Observer became the first Sunday paper with a similar

appointment in 2001.Between them, they dealt with more than

25,000 complaints and queries over the year to October 2008, resulting in nearly 2,000 corrections. They also wrote more than 60 columns dealing with issues ranging from blogging to the use of cliches, as part of a continuing attempt to inform and educate our readership about our editorial decisions.

While the concept of the readers’ editor originated in the US, the economic downturn has led to 12 ombudsmen’s posts being axed there in 2008.

Stephen Pritchard, readers’ editor of the Observer, in 2008 became president of the Organisation of News Ombudsmen (ONO), the international group who represent readers, viewers and listeners and promote accountability within the media. He wrote: “As the credit crunch bites, some managements are viewing the position of ombudsman as an indulgence they can no longer afford.

They are wrong. An ombudsman engenders trust, and trust is a positive asset in any business, but particularly in the media. Readers, viewers or listeners are empowered when they know there is an independent arbiter they can turn to. Remove that post and the audience is left voiceless and suspicious of your motives.”

Siobhain Butterworth, the Guardian readers’ editor, says some critics say such a post is unnecessary as readers can now challenge journalists directly on the web. But she argues the number of objections, ideas and questions that have flowed into the readers’ editor’s office over the past year suggest that their senders value the readers’ editor’s role in the Guardian’s self-regulation.

Readers’ editors ensure the maintenance of high standards of accuracy, fairness and balance in our reporting and writing as well as creating new channels of communication with and greater responsiveness to readers, whether by phone, email, the internet, surface mail, or through the paper.

Readers’ editorsThe readers’ editor role is not just a means to communicate but to seek change

One of the central tenets of the Scott Trust is to secure the Guardian in perpetuity as a “quality national newspaper without party affiliation, remaining faithful to its liberal tradition.”

People often assume the Guardian is linked inextricably to the Labour party, but it has in fact supported all three main political parties during its history.

The issue of party affiliation came to the fore in 2008 with Labour fury at a major Guardian three-day investigation into the “new Conservatives”. This concluded with a leader column personally signed off by the editor in chief Alan Rusbridger, claiming that an attempt by ministers to present the Tories as masking “rightwing instincts” is not “wholly true” and that “the new Conservatives claim to be progressive at least deserves consideration. Over three days, this paper has tried to offer it.”

Conversely, the Observer was accused by Guardian investigative writer Nick Davies, in his book Flat Earth News, of losing sight of its political independence in the run-up to the Iraq war by becoming too close to the Labour government.

Rusbridger says the Guardian’s ability to choose which party to support, without a proprietor breathing down its neck, is one of the core strengths of the paper: “It is much more in the tradition of the paper to say what we believe and critically interrogate politicians rather than blind party loyalty.

“It would have been extremely strange if the Guardian, through imagined loyalty to the Labour party, had supported many of the things that have happened since 1997. This sometimes drives New Labour into a range of emotions from disappointment to fury but that is just the way it is.”

That anger was expressed in a leaked Labour party memo in the wake of our series on the new Conservatives, reported on in the Independent: “It is those progressives who are flirting with David Cameron who need to listen. If Guardian readers follow yesterday’s leader — though they surely have more sense — and we ended up with a Tory goverment, there is no doubt at all that the result, after the rhetoric and gimmicks faded, would be a smaller, less active state, money having been redistributed to the richest and cuts in public services.”

Rusbridger says it is important to test the Conservatives’ claims to have changed and “our conclusion was that in some respects

they have. We will continue to reserve judgement as they go along.

“Of course it is conceivable we would support them and the Guardian has supported the Tories in the past at a time when the paper felt the Labour party of the day was worn out and it would be good for them to have a period regrouping out of office.

“This ability to have the freedom to choose whom to support is is a core strength of the Guardian. It would be terrible if were to say there were no circumstances in which we would support the Conservative party. That would suggest our mind is closed.”

Nick Davies’ book caused a furore with criticisms of all the quality papers. But there was particular disquiet in the Observer, which he accused of having been too close to the Labour party spin doctor Alastair Campbell ahead of the Iraq war.

Davies says Observer readers were “slowly soaked in disinformation” and that the political editor at the time became a “conduit for government announcements.”

In a letter published in the Guardian in September 2008, Davies wrote that the editor at the time Roger Alton “was manipulated directly by Downing Street and indirectly through key reporters by intelligence agencies and Downing Street again. The result was that he published mighty falsehoods because he thought they were true and failed to publish true stories because he thought they were false ... The manipulation of the Observer in the cause of war happened. It needs an explanation.”

Alton, now the Independent’s editor, as well as then political editor Kamal Ahmed, now communications director for the Equality and Human Rights Commission, vehemently deny the charges.

In a review of the book in the Guardian, Peter Preston, former Guardian editor and a regular contributor to the Observer, accuses Davies’ chapter on the Observer as “being full of cop-out clauses ... and so notably short of attested fact that PA [Press Association] would bin it without a second thought.

“Davies doesn’t agree with the Oberver’s leader line on Iraq, and nor do I as a matter of fact. But the mush of hindsight, No 10 briefings that might or might not have mattered and dissident CIA leakers two removes down the line aren’t particularly compelling.

“This isn’t the reporter as unbiased crusader, meticulously assembling his case. It’s up close and personal.”

Rusbridger says that on the issue of the Iraq war, it was a sign of strength that the Guardian opposed the war and the Observer supported it: “It showed that we are independent of anyone else and could arrive at our own decisions. I hope that will happen again, that the Observer and the Guardian will have different ideas of what progressive politics is. This results in a website that is much richer, with a broader range of voices and sensibilities.”

Political affiliation

A quality national newspaper without party affiliation

For more information see guardian.co.uk/readerseditor →

EditorialLeading liberal voice

14

One of the founding principles of the Guardian and Observer was the tackling of social injustice, something which chimes strongly with our readers. It began at home but has spread abroad, recently to the Ugandan village of Katine

EditorialSocial justice

Tackling inequality

S ocial justice was one of the core principles behind the creation of both the Guardian and Observer and both remain passionate advocates. Those behind the birth of the Manchester

Guardian, for example, were reformers and radicals looking for change at a time when Manchester had some of the worst housing and working conditions in the country. Child labour was rife and the city was prospering from the trade in cotton, courtesy of slaves in southern America.

The need for journalists to take up the case of marginalised sections of society both in the UK and overseas is just as important now as it was then.

Our coverage of social issues is embedded across all sections of our papers on a consistent basis as well as specialist features every week in the Guardian in our Society and Education sections.

Examples of international coverage over the past year include a Guardian special report into the dumping of millions of tonnes of the developed world’s toxic electronic waste in the ports of west Africa and an investigation by the Observer into the supply chain of low-cost retailer Primark, which found children as young as 11 in refugee camps producing some of its cheapest garments. On the domestic front, Observer Magazine carried a cover story on the hell of being an asylum seeker in the UK by award-winning novelist Mark Hadden.

Our drive to highlight social and economic inequalities in the UK and around the world is shared by our readership, who showed a high level of satisfaction with our coverage of social justice issues in our recent readers survey. Ninety-one per cent of Guardian readers, 84% of Observer readers and three-quarters of our web users scored it as either good or excellent (see graphic on page 8). When we asked them what issues they would like more coverage on, social justice and human rights came top of the list.

Our readers share the drive to highlight inequalities

Transforming the lives of a community Photo: Dan Chung

instrumental to our coverage as it allows us to tell the story of international development in a creative and engaging way, using text, pictures, audio and video.

We have also created a section for UK teachers and students with curriculum-linked lesson activities for primary and secondary level. These support teachers and students in using the site to further their understanding of global citizenship.

Interaction has also been encouraged to enable readers to donate money, as well as comment on the project through blogs. Katine has led to one of guardian.co.uk’s first attempts at “crowdsourcing”, encouraging experts to critique and offer advice via blogs on how to improve delivery of the project.

To ensure transparency, a team of senior UK reporters and film makers regularly visiting Katine to assess progress. We have also appointed an independent evaluation expert who is regularly visiting Katine to monitor Amref’s work as well as ensuring our editorial coverage does not negatively impact the project and the local community.

In order to get a true diversity of voices, we have employed two local Ugandan journalists through the NGO Panos. One of these writers has been hired to train community members so that they can directly voice their own views on the project and its impact on their lives.

15

EditorialKatine

KatineInternational development is an area we have traditionally championed. To take our coverage to a new level we have launched an innovative three-year integrated development project in a rural community in eastern Uganda.

The £3m scheme, in partnership with several stakeholders including the African development charity Amref and Barclays bank, is aimed at supporting a community of 25,000 people living in and around the village of Katine, most of whom live on around 50p a day and have been affected by civil war and climate change.

The project, which focuses on health, water, education, financial inclusion, livelihoods and governance is receiving wide recognition, winning three major awards: the Launch of 2008 award at the prestigious Association of Online Publishers (AOP) as well as a Clarion award for best website and a One World Media award for its effective communication of sustainable development issues.

The citation for the AOP award praised the Katine website for its “unprecedented depth and breadth while maintaining its focus on a single subject,” while the Clarion highlighted “the best use of the internet to deliver a clear message and call to action”.

Separately, the Washington-based Eisenhower Foundation has held up the Katine project as “one of the most promising new variations on the public journalism theme” and is exploring whether it can be replicated in American inner cities.

This project offers readers a unique opportunity to understand the complexity and difficulties involved in the process of supporting an impoverished community to transform their lives. Such close-up reportage and analysis over such a long period has never been attempted before.

The new web 2.0 platform has been

For more information see guardian.co.uk/katine →

AliC

iA C

ANte

r, D

AN C

HU

NG

Most Katine

villagers live

on around

50p a day

16

CommercialWe will work with our readers to gain a deeper understanding of what products and services they want in the sustainability arena, and use this to engage with our advertisers and sponsors

This year’s targets

1. See targets 2 and 3 from last year (below)2. Grow the Guardian Publishers Network by 50%3. Launch our use of Noughtilus to the advertising industry4. Measure and report on the carbon footprint of branded content campaigns that have a sustainability message5. Move to online proofing for all advertising copy wherever feasible to reduce print consumption6. The GNM advertising department will work collaboratively towards its ambition of becoming an ethical-leader business

Last year’s targets

1. Create a full-time position within commercial to develop and implement a commercial sustainability strategy 2. Identify and understand commercial revenue that can be attributed to sustainable advertising (ongoing)3. Work with new and existing commercial suppliers to raise awareness of our sustainability vision and ensure that all future tendering processes include a sustainability element (ongoing)4. Ask our flight offer suppliers to ensure that all future flight offers advertised in our publications will include a voluntary carbon offset 5. Investigate future potential green partnerships (ongoing)

Key = no progress = modest progress = good progress = target completed

How to create a virtuous circle

The challenge for GNM has been to develop a strategy that can achieve its commercial objectives without compromising its values

17

CommercialSustainabiliy strategy

O ne of the qualities on which GNM prides itself is its ability to act swiftly when it gets the bit between its teeth. This has certainly been true when it comes to the commercial

arm recognising the part it can play in realising our sustainability vision.

The spur was a partnership project in 2007 with the sustainability charity Forum for the Future which worked with senior managers and directors to see how sustainability could ensure the future success of GNM.

Recommendations from the study resulted in us becoming the first media company to employ a full-time commercial sustainability manager, who is working to develop new revenue streams as well as encouraging existing clients to reduce their carbon footprints.

This was followed up with the creation of a team of internal executives as well as external consultants to develop an editorial and commercial strategy for creating the world’s leading environment website.

In October 2008, GNM employed a senior executive, with extensive experience in creating web communities, to implement this strategy, reporting directly into managing director Tim Brooks.

Brooks says: “Editorially and commercially the Guardian has a well-deserved reputation for its commitment to environment and sustainability issues and we intend to create a world-class digital environment resource.

“If we are smart we can create a virtuous circle. By further amplifying our editorial reputation, we create a magnetic force that attracts companies who are also thought leaders in this area.

“We can then help our clients. We are in the business to make money and clearly it is much better if we can genuinely support them to be more sustainable.”

GNM’s reputation as a trusted voice on issues such as the environment has already led to many clients using our newspapers and website as a vehicle for communications in this area, such as British Gas, Carbon Trust and Origins.

The development of our commercial strategy has been a good example of how our values find expression in both strategic

planning as well as the practical day-to-day activities within the company.

Jonathan Lenson, a management consultant with Bain & Co, who was drafted in to help develop our green strategy, says the major difference between working for GNM and more traditional companies was that values were at the heart of his brief. “Plans were considered on the company’s ability to increase its impact by reaching more people and influencing them. At the heart of everything was providing something of value irrespective of whether it was going to generate profit or not.

“That allowed us to use some of the activities that we believed would be profitable to help us offset other things that would not make money but would be of value to our readers. In my experience from a consulting background, for other companies it is the bottom line and profit that is the most important factor. So it was both refreshing and unusual working at a company which is very commercial in part as well as having a shared purpose across both editorial and commercial departments.”

As we seek to embed sustainability into our commercial activities, we felt it was important to benchmark ourselves against our competitors. We estimate that in 2008, GNM garnered a 30% share of sustainable display advertising revenue and 20% of our sponsored content reflected sustainable messages. In addition, 13% of revenue from our reader offers stems from sustainable activity.

We create a magnetic force attracting companies who are also thought leaders

Tim Brooks, GNM managing director

EAM

ON

N M

CCAB

E

EditorialLeading liberal voice

18

CommercialInitiatives

The Guardian Publisher Network The Guardian Publisher Network, which is linked to our editorial environment network (see page 8), is founded on a principle of mutual benefit for GNM, publisher partners, advertisers and readers. It makes it possible for us to meet our vision of enabling small and emerging businesses to develop their markets by earning valuable advertising revenues.

We partner with small to medium-sized digital publishers, who have been approved by our editorial team. We promote the publishers from the guardian.co.uk platform and the GNM ad department sells our partners’ advertising space on their behalf and we both share the advertising revenue generated from this.

Each of the sites makes a valuable contribution to the wider online debate on sustainability, focusing on a range of topics from deforestation (Mongabay.com), to ethical design (Inhabitat.com). Readers therefore benefit from direct access to content, services and channels to action and advertisers have increased exposure to a responsive audience. During 2008 we also launched an environmentally aware travel network which includes publishers such Alastair Sawday’s and ResponsibleTravel.com.

More than 30 sites are represented across the two networks, delivering over 25 million ad impressions per month. Our intention is to increase the size of the network by more than half in 2009. We also intend to roll out contextually relevant Guardian Jobs and develop sponsorship opportunities in addition to the existing display advertising. Crucially, the publisher network also dovetails with GNM’s editorial strategy around content sharing.

For more information go to guardian.co.uk/publishernetwork

Green Light Our launch of Green Light, in association with the Henley Centre, represents the first industry tool for planning green campaigns. It enables any marketeer preparing an environmentally focused campaign to determine not only who to speak to and

where to talk to them, but also what to say and how to say it; ultimately it provides them with an in-depth understanding of ethical consumerism that can be used to inform both the creative process and as a basis for planning and buying relevant media.

Green Light identified five consumer typologies: onlookers (26%), conveniently conscious (35%), positive choosers (31%), principled pioneers (4%), vocal activists (4%).

Throughout 2008 we shared Green Light with more than 500 media planners, buyers, researchers, creatives, corporate social responsibility professionals and client-side marketing teams from companies, including Unilever, Coca-Cola and Honda.

Ten of the UK’s top media agencies have already integrated Green Light into their collection of planning tools and are actively using it. For example, it has informed the planning for M&S, BA, the government’s Central Office of Information, Banrock Station and Virgin Atlantic.

Green Light has given us the opportunity to engage and share knowledge with readers and existing clients on the complex issue of sustainability and to lead the debate within the media industry on consumption habits.

For more information see adinfo- guardian.co.uk/display/research/

NoughtilusGuardian Plus, which builds bespoke content for clients, such as supplements and websites, is the area of the business where we believe we can have the most significant impact with regards to sustainable communications.

We have formed a partnership with

A rapidly growing part of our business is Guardian Professional, which seeks to maximise profits through activities ranging from conferences and sponsored supplements to the development of online educational tools.

Sustainability is a key focus for the division, with a number of conferences organised on environment and social issues including climate change, adaptation, sustainable housing and building schools for the future. The Guardian Climate Change Summit in 2008 included a keynote presentation from Nobel prizewinner Dr RJ Pachauri with the theme focusing on fighting climate change fatigue and how to keep stakeholders engaged.

Other sponsored events included the Energy Saving Trust Fleet Hero Awards, which highlights organisations that are addressing climate change by reducing business travel emissions, and the newly launched Guardian International Development Journalism Competition which aims to raise awareness of issues in the developing world.

The sales and sponsorship team, working with Guardian editorial, have produced a number of sponsored supplements, which,

apart from being an important source of revenue, allow us to explore, in more depth than editorial budgets would otherwise allow, topics that we hope are of interest to readers.

Environment-related supplements included Greener Schools: What role should sustainability play in teaching, in association with the British Gas Generation Green programme, and Flood Alert: How Britain is coping with a wetter climate.

The supplements also covered social issues, including one on whether the UN’s millennium development goals were working, which was sponsored by the Department for International Development.

Guardian Professional’s contract publishing team are producing and managing the websites of two new high-profile projects with sustainability at their core: The Great Plant Hunt (greatplanthunt.org) and The Pod (jointhepod.org). Both encourage mass participation

Guardian Professional

Given the green light...While the environment website strategy was being developed, GNM’s commercial sustainability manager spent the past year launching several innovative initiatives and forging new partnerships

→

→

19

CommercialInitiatives

Noughtilus which has developed web-based software that will measure and forecast the environmental impact of advertising campaigns with an initial focus on carbon. It will enable us to:

Anticipate, manage and eventually •

reduce the environmental impacts of our bespoke contentImprove our eco-efficiency and •

help Guardian Plus deliver greater environmental benefits to our clients and the businessRecord improvements over time and •

demonstrate our commitment to responsible business practice Educate our staff and our suppliers on •

responsible business practiceDemonstrate responsible communications •

strategies to consumers and clients.

T here is an ongoing debate at GNM about whether it is right to refuse certain types of advertising for products that are particularly damaging to society and

the environment. Our columnist George Monbiot has criticised newspapers for failing to ban adverts that “make the destruction of the biosphere seem socially acceptable”.

Alan Rusbridger, editor in chief of the Guardian and Observer, argues that our journalism matters more than the advertising and as “long as the journalism is free and we allow George Monbiot to criticise us, and we feel free to criticise the people who advertise, that is more important than the advertising.”

This difference of opinon is shared by our readers, with some saying our journalism cannot maintain its independence when it “relies on polluters’ money to survive”, while others say we live in a free society and the implication that “we’ll see an ad for a cheap flight and, like a bunch of lemmings, rush out and book it, patronising.”

In our annual readers’ survey (see page 12), we ask our readers and web users whether we have a responsibility to refuse to carry a number of categories of advertising (see graphic above). The results continue to show that issues of social justice figure much more highly among people’s concerns than climate change, while a quarter of our web users and a nearly a fifth of newspaper

readers do not object to any of the listed forms of advertising. One in 10 objected to advertising for budget airlines, around a fifth for oil companies, a third for adverts for high emission vehicles.

Top among people’s concerns was a new category introduced for fashion brands that rely on cheap foreign labour, followed by ads featuring music with offensive lyrics and those using sexual imagery. In nearly all categories, web users were less concerned than our newspaper readers.

We already have in place procedures for preventing advertisements considered to be racist, sexist or homophobic. We also pay particular attention to when we enter into a closer association with a commercial partner, for example in producing the many sponsored supplements that appear in the paper each year (see Guardian Professional, left). Careful consideration is given to ensure the partnership is appropriate. The commercial departments consult editorial if they feel a venture may conflict with our standards or values.

Over the past year, a handful of supplements were not taken beyond the scoping stage either because the prospective sponsors (which included those in the private and voluntary sectors) expected a level of editorial input beyond that which our published guidelines allow or because the proposed project, while financially beneficial, was not thought to add sufficient value for readers. In one case, we did not proceed because we knew too little about the business activities of an international client.

Should we ban certain types of advertising?

Types of advertising readers and users feel GNM should refuse to carry

SOURCE: GNM READER SURVEY 2008

■The Guardian ■The Observer ■guardian.co.uk

Fashion brandsthat use cheapforeign labour

Music withoffensivelyrics

Adverts usingsexual imagery

Gambling Religious For highemission cars

For oilcompanies

For budgetairlines

Political I would notobject to any

Advertising

60%

58%

48%

46%

35%

40%

19%

11%

10% 16

%

57%

56%

46%

47%

34%

36%

18%

10%

12%

18%

41% 38

% 31%

37%

39%

29% 22%

10%

20%

26%

One in 10 readers

object to advertising

for budget airlines

among schoolchildren with the aim of effecting real behavioural change around energy saving and conservation.

Guardian Professional has developed online resources that enable students to run both small-scale projects such as switching off unnecessary lights and large initiatives such as changing their school's transport plan.

On an operational front, the Guardian Professional events team has put in

place new procedures to reduce the environmental impact of events by sourcing materials with strong green credentials. This includes using 100% recycled paper for all communications, pencils made from recycled CD cases, carbon-neutral beer and biodegradable events bags made of natural jute.

Our insistence on high sustainability standards from suppliers is having an impact, with one audiovisual company we work with creating its own environmental policy, appointing a sustainability manager, and developing a kite-marked sustainable event package for clients across the events industry.

Guardian Professional

of readers object to oil companies advertising

EditorialLeading liberal voice

The next big challenge

20

A far cry from last year’s successes, GNM is now facing challenges imposed by the economic downturn and audience migration from print

CommercialRealities

I t’ s hard to remember a time when the environment has not been challenging for newspaper publishers: declining profitability across the industry, steady falls in print circulation, the migration of

advertising pounds out of newspapers, the need for investment in digital growth and the cost-cutting initiatives employed by media companies in an attempt to mitigate all this. Last year was no exception as we estimate, on the basis of publicly available information, that quality press publishers lost around £123m (after exceptionals) on revenues of over £1.1bn.

GNM’s operating loss before exceptional items was £26.4m compared with £15.9m on turnover up from £245.7m to £261.9m. The increase in operating loss reflected increased investment and restructuring costs and amortisation. The loss rose to £82.4m after exceptionals, due largely to a write-down of print assets and a print contract provision.

The scale of the challenge we now face, however, is of a totally different order in the wake of the global financial crisis. Media analysts on both sides of the Atlantic believe 2009 will be an incredibly tough year for any company with a serious exposure to advertising. GNM currently makes 60% of revenues from advertising. Although this may seem alarmist, in the last recession 18 years ago, advertising overall fell by 10% with recruitment revenues plunging by 40%.

This is a far cry from the financial year ending March 2008, which proved to be one of the most successful for GNM in recent history. We reaped the benefit of earlier strategic investments in the Berliner colour presses and maintained our strong digital advertising yields on the back of our growing online audiences for guardian.co.uk.

GNM achieved an overall 7% increase in revenues year on year, one of the strongest performances in the market. Revenues from copy sales, display advertising, both in print and online, and digital recruitment all grew ahead of the overall market — which itself enjoyed steady growth in the core print areas and very rapid growth in digital.

With the economy now in retreat, the picture is very different, with publishers turning to cover price rises, much as they did in 1990-91. The cost of the Times, Telegraph, and Saturday Guardian all

went up by 10p in autumn 2008 while the Independent jumped 20p to be the first general-interest newspaper to hit the £1 mark in the UK.

There are risks attached to this strategy, given that every quality paper, with the exception of the Observer, lost paid-for sales last year and that readers are more than usually price sensitive at the moment.

It is at times like these that the support of our sole shareholder the Scott Trust comes into its own, allowing us to continue planning for the long term, rather than slashing costs. So we do not intend to just retreat into our core. Our goal, successfully achieved in previous downturns, is to exit this one in better shape than we have entered it and to deliver against our vision of being the world’s leading liberal voice.

Despite the relatively downbeat prognosis for newspapers this year, we are as committed as ever to print. Last year digital revenues accounted for 10.5% of total revenues for GNM. While we expect this to grow, it will be several years before digital overtakes print as our primary revenue source.

From a purely commercial perspective, our digital UK position and reach is by far the most important factor to advertisers, so maintaining and growing our domestic audience remains key to our digital strategy.

However, it is no longer adequate to look only at our UK position, given that we now have such a large global audience. If we define guardian.co.uk as a global newspaper website competing for audience against all other newspaper websites then we are within the top 10 in the world along with papers in China, America, Japan and Turkey.

However, if one looks at news websites, rather than newspaper websites, we see our audience dwarfed in comparison to the reach of an array of American and Chinese sites, with the BBC as the only UK contender.

Guardian Media Group

The reason GNM is able to fulfil its core purpose is because of the financial support of its parent company Guardian Media Group (GMG). Over the past five years alone, GMG has invested £207m in GNM, part of which has gone into new all-colour presses and the development of our global website.

GMG is able to do this by running a portfolio of profit-maximising businesses in areas such as radio, regional papers, property and secondhand car sales.

Alan Rusbridger, editor in chief of GNM, says the unusual structure works because “Guardian journalists appreciate the rest of the company is run on tough, commerical lines … and our colleagues in other divisions show an understanding that, constitutionally, legally and morally, they are there to support liberal journalism at its best.”

In 2008 GMG transformed its portfolio with the development of a strategic partnership with the private equity firm Apax Partners, first of all selling it a 49% stake in Trader Media Group (TMG) for more than £600m and then joining forces with it to acquire Emap for £1bn (see www.gmgplc.co.uk/financials for financial results).

GMG has invested £200m of the sale price of TMG in a long-term externally managed investment fund weighted away from media and UK stocks.

GMG chief executive Carolyn McCall says the purpose behind these moves is to reduce the group’s reliance on classified advertising and the UK economy. “Virtually everything is changing; everything, that is, except what we’re here for. We remain absolutely committed to maintaining the Guardian’s historic independence.

“But we want to go further than that. At the head of GMG’s list of priorities for the year ahead is supporting the Guardian’s ambition to become the world’s leading liberal voice through the international expansion of guardian.co.uk.”

McCall acknowledges criticisms in the Guardian’s coverage levelled at private equity firms: “That is the meaning of editorial independence: our journalists are free to write what they think. That is the unique nature and strength of the organisation.”

But she adds that Apax was chosen “very carefully, with both our commercial responsibilities and values in mind.”

GMG is also developing a group-wide strategy on sustainability. Representatives have been appointed in each of the group’s six divisions, who are supported at the centre by GMG’s head of corporate development as well as non-executive board director John Bartle who has taken on the mantle of group sustainability champion.

With the support of the Carbon Trust, GMG is currently implementing a carbon management programme to reduce its carbon footprint.

It will be a tough year for any company with serious exposure to advertising

PeopleTo be successful multimedia publishers and serve our growing international audience, we have to move away from the familiar routines of the past

21

EditorialLeading liberal voice

Reorganisation for the digital age

22

It has been a year of difficult decision-making, but the goal has been to future-proof the organisation and make it fit for purpose in the years to come

PeoplePeople and change

G NM’s transformation from a UK print-based publisher to an international multimedia company has required a fundamental re-examination of working practices and

resources across all our commercial and editorial departments, which has involved long and sometimes difficult negotiations with the unions.

Liz Forgan, chair of the Scott Trust, wrote in a publication that went to all staff, that alongside a fierce commitment to editorial independence came a need for rigorous business management to protect our values: “The second part is uncomfortable for some people, but equally important for the Guardian’s long‑term security.

“Just as the Scott Trust is dedicated to maintaining and promoting the Guardian as an independent voice, so it will always require it to be run as a profit‑seeking, efficient and cost‑effective business.

“If we are to be successful multimedia publishers and serve our growing international audience, we have to move away from the familiar routines of the past.

“There are, of course, dissenting voices (this is the Guardian, after all) who argue that such change is contrary to ‘the Scott tradition’. So it’s worth remembering this: the Scott Trust exists to sustain the Guardian’s journalism, not to preserve the status quo.”

With this in mind, over the last 18 months every department in the commercial side of the business has undergone a restructuring process to shape the business so that is fit for future purpose. By the end of 2008 the roles of around 220 employees were being made redundant, with 65 redeployed internally and 155 leaving the company.

Of the 85 employees who had left the company by the end of August 2008, 92% had been supported in their resettlement by outplacement specialists; 51 gained a new role and the remainder decided to either take a career break, return to education, retire or become self‑employed.

In editorial, the National Union of Journalists accepted the need for change within the house agreement. The old clause relating to compulsory redundancies was removed and replaced by a new clause which covers all journalists in GNM editorial.

It states: “GNM is committed to avoiding compulsory redundancies. Both parties acknowledge that in extreme circumstances reductions in staffing may be unavoidable. In such circumstances GNM would negotiate any such changes with the NUJ.” A voluntary redundancy programme was opened up to all editorial staff in 2008 to which 23 staff had signed up to by August.

Managing director Tim Brooks admits the restructuring programme has involved some tough decisions, the most difficult being the closure of GNM’s telesales operation in Manchester with the loss of 47 jobs. He says: “The staff there were very shocked because they had never questioned whether we would have an operation there or not, especially given that Manchester is our spiritual home.

“It was a very difficult change for those people but it also showed that we were prepared to take a radical approach. The restructure was not about removing cost but becoming more effective. For example, we were conducting market research separately in both the commercial and marketing departments and we have put them into

one team. As a result we are getting better product because we have multiplied the brain power.”

Given that GNM is values led, Brooks says the company, along with the rest of GMG, has been looking at a more holistic way of measuring the success of the company. “Market driven companies concentrate on performance so they think about earnings and how that can make you behave. But companies that are interested in long‑term stability focus on the overall health of the company.”

“This is difficult to measure on your P&L but you can find measures of health such as low staff turnover and low sickness rates, which in the case of GNM fell last year from 4.4 days to 3.2 days, which compares with the national average of 8.4 days. Another would be staff engagement in unpaid activities such as volunteering. Do they join the choir, read at a school, play five‑a‑side football?”

Editorial integrationThe commercial restructuring has been followed by an even more radical integration of the Guardian, Observer and guardian.co.uk staff into one team working across all three platforms. This has been achieved through widespread consultation rather than imposing a template as other media companies have done.

Cross‑functional teams from the Guardian, Observer and guardian.co.uk were created and worked alongside external consultants, with four principles:• To find the most appropriate digital expression of our journalism 24/7

This year’s targets

1. Appraisals: 80% of commercial and 25% of editorial staff to be appraised by December 2009 2. Improve scores in the 2009 employee survey, relating to career progression, transparency of pay decisions and fair recruitment

Last year’s targets

1. All senior editors to undergo management training 2. Appraisals: 65% of commercial and 50% of Observer editorial staff to be appraised. All Guardian editors to undergo appraisal training and develop a plan to appraise their staff

(See also Diversity targets, page 26)

Key = No progress = modest progress = good progress = target completed

23

PeoplePeople and change

• To preserve and extend the integrity and distinctiveness of the Guardian, the Observer and the web• To design structures that are more manageable, where we can ensure people get the training they require and receive proper management feedback including appraisals• To plan changes within the existing headcount.

One of the first tests of the new system was our coverage of the Beijing Olympics. All of the 20 journalists who went to China worked on every platform with 90% of copy going on the web first. A dozen subeditors on the paper volunteered for 1.30am‑8.30am shifts to allow 24/7 coverage.

To achieve organisational clarity we used several communication methods for the first time such as instant messaging between the newsdesks in London and Beijing, and Googledocs for assignment grids and copy filing.

As a result of our Olympics coverage, we saw 50 million website hits in a week for the first time ever.

Brooks says: “There has been a huge amount of work thinking it through and a great deal of advocacy was required to persuade the union of the need for it. We have 780 journalist posts and more than 700 are in some way changing.

“We have already seen the benefit of this approach in events such as the Olympics in Beijing. We got more traffic on our website than our competitors because we approached it with an integrated desk using all our considerable editorial resources. This simply meant we were providing a faster and better quality service.”

National Union of JournalistsThe views from the 22nd floor of the Euston Tower are breathtaking, as NUJ negotiators can testify. We whiled away many hours in the government conciliation service offices, trying to broker a way forward after calling a dispute in October. The move was born out of frustration that seven months after the editor had unveiled his plans for integration and 24/7 working, crucial information was still not on the table.

While the NUJ accepted the editor’s vision, no self-respecting union would sign a blank cheque. Members exercised great patience, but with our April pay rise still unpaid, the dispute seemed the only way to break the deadlock. It took several days and nights to thrash out terms that would underpin the massive operational changes envisaged: to integrate Guardian, Observer and website staff into pods and expand operations to 24/7.

The chapel met many times over the autumn before finally agreeing to extra flexibility in exchange for a bundle of measures which should benefit the entire workforce. Under the terms, the no-compulsory-redundancy clause has been extended to cover the entire editorial workforce; until then, it had only applied to journalists on the paper. A long overdue job evaluation and pay audit will be completed by early next year to flush out once and for all outstanding pay inequality in editorial.

Despite a huge pay lift two years ago, journalists on the web doing like-for-like work as their colleagues on the paper still do not receive like-for-like pay, notably subeditors and production staff. There are also some striking pay differentials on the paper, which cannot be accounted for purely on the basis of length of experience.

As I write, we are discussing the terms of reference for the pay audit, which will be conducted by an outside expert (following the flawed in-house evaluation conducted two years ago). The NUJ has made it clear the audit must not pay lip service to the principle of pay transparency and equal pay for work of equal value (see pay reviews, page 25).

The Guardian sorely needs pay bands, which many assume, wrongly, we already have. We will use the findings of the audit for the 2009 pay round. We also secured three review dates over two years to adjust the new house agreement as integration beds down. In exchange, the chapel agreed the principle of multiplatform working, with proper training put in place for staff to adapt, and 24/7 working rotas. The chapel will monitor the workload burden following multiplatform, multimedia working and use our findings to renegotiate where necessary.

We have already had to report the plight of one department where journalists say that the twin demands of web and paper now leave them insufficient time to do their job properly. They simply need more journalists. Indeed, many of us remain unconvinced

that the editor’s vision can be delivered on existing editorial numbers. What we do accept is that going into uncharted new territory requires an element of “suck it and see” on both sides. It is a team effort, and the NUJ will fully play its part in monitoring the impact of the changes on journalists’ working lives, and on the high quality journalism our members seek to deliver. Our readers would expect nothing less. Hélène Mulholland is mother of chapel of the Guardian NUJ

UniteIt has been a difficult year for the so-called “commercial” sector of staff at GNM as redundancies have gone beyond 150 as a consequence of the company’s centralisation policies and the move to Kings Place.

From the chapel’s point of view, this is bad news, and at a time when the political climate continues to regard trade unions as dinosaurs, it shows they are needed more than ever. Membership is increasing as employees realise the importance of having a voice to represent them in these increasingly difficult times.

When the knife has been wielded, it has been no respecter of positions or areas, and although it has not been done so at random — indeed, it has been specific — it has had a devastating effect on those targeted.

Perhaps the saddest aspect in all of this is the fact that in Manchester, the birthplace of the Guardian in 1821, there is but a token presence of the paper’s employees and, as the paper moves to King’s Cross following a sojourn in Farringdon of over 40 years, it is disturbing to think about what might be happening 40 years hence.

As I write this a couple of weeks before our annual pay review, the chapel feels a certain amount of trepidation as the “credit crunch” starts to bite.

Trying to look on the positive side — a vital attribute for any member of the workforce — we are about to move into a brand-new building, which will give everyone a lift as we become part of the excitement of the King’s Cross development plans.

Adopting the pragmatic approach, we must accept that the newspaper industry is changing at an alarming rate; we must move with the times and adapt accordingly. However, it will be a long time before those clouds of redundancy start to lift and those changes, certainly in the form of the company’s “working across three platforms” policy, may see more job loses as editorial areas merge and the consequent need for administrative support diminishes.

The chapel continues to work assiduously on behalf of all non-editorial staff and has an excellent relationship with all of the other chapels in London and Manchester. We will always be here to respond to and protect the needs of all of our members, and to support other chapels, whatever their needs.Mike Pike is father of the chapel of GNM Unite

Union response

I am proud to work at GNM

%Not sure

9

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

2

Agree/Agree strongly

89

I understand the reasons why GNM is restructuring the business

%Not sure

12

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

6

Agree/Agree strongly

82

I think the way GNM is restructuring the business is being fairly handled

%Not sure

43

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

15

Agree/Agree strongly

42

SOURCE: GNM EMPLOYEE SURVEY 2008

EditorialLeading liberal voice

24

PeopleStaff survey

Feedback time

The latest staff survey results show that though loyalty remains high during a time of change, there is still a lot of groundwork for the company to do

D uring the the company-wide reorganisation, GNM undertook its latest employee survey. More than 1,200 filled in the questionnaire, representing

70% of the workforce. The results showed that despite the upheaval, the majority of staff understood the need for change and that it had not dented their enormous pride in working for GNM.

Nearly 90% of staff are proud to work for GNM with only 2% disagreeing — way above the industry average — with similar numbers saying they choose to put in extra effort over and above their basic job requirements.

Other high scores included 78% who feel the Scott Trust protection enables us to maintain high journalistic standards, 82% who would recommend GNM as an employer, 86% who say their working environment is friendly, and 82% who understand why GNM is restructuring the business.

On the flipside, employees continue to be disappointed about career progression, pay transparency and appraisals, issues which have been highlighted as weaknesses ever since the surveys were introduced several years ago.

Some of the lower scores were 41% saying they do not know how their pay is determined (although only a third state that they have actively sought clarity on this), 28% saying they do not know who to ask about career development, 30% not getting regular feedback on their work performance, 31% who are unclear about who is accountable for making decisions in GNM and 25% who believe people are not held accountable for their decisions.

Tim Brooks, managing director, says: “The timing of the survey was deliberately chosen to coincide with the period of change to check the pulse of the organisation.

“I was delighted by it and also disappointed. Given the fact that we are putting the people within GNM through a hell of a lot of change, some of it not welcome, we were expecting some poor results. But on fundamentals, the scores

were as high for questions asking why the company is changing and whether staff were proud to work for GNM and would recommend it as an employer.

“What was disappointing is that the areas of weakness identified in previous surveys are still there. We are now focusing on these and we have to do more.

“These are fair comments on things we are bad at. It will take a long time to persuade people that we have changed. People have to have their own personal experience of change to feel different.”

Following the results, a number of actions have been taken to deal with the four major areas of concern raised by staff: appraisals, career progression, pay reviews, and recruitment. Progress on these will be regularly communicated to staff on the company intranet Spike.

say their working environment is friendly

86%

GNM’s audio department Photo: Teri Pengilley

GNM staff at Camley Street Natural Park

25

PeopleStaff survey

For the fourth year in a row, we have failed to meet our targets on appraisals, despite being repeatedly criticised by our independent social auditor (see page 43).

In the year ending March 2008, the completion rate in the commercial departments failed to meet our target of 65% and actually fell to 53%.

In Observer editorial, the figure rose significantly to 41% but missed its target of 50% and Guardian editorial made significant progress in training its editors to carry out appraisals but only got halfway towards its plan of completing the training programme.

The large-scale reorganisation, including the change in people’s roles, played a part in this disappointing performance but it is also accepted that senior managers have not given it the necessary priority.

To combat this and encourage directors to significantly improve their performance, a league table of the statistics are being shared at monthly board meetings and at commercial directors’ meetings. The headline figures are also being published on the staff

intranet each month.On top of this, a formal training course

is being developed for managers across the company, and they are being sent an automated reminder a month before an appraisal is due.

It is not only getting the appraisals done that appears to be the problem but also ensuring they are followed up. Of those who had an appraisal, the staff survey showed that while nearly two-thirds concluded with agreed actions, only 39% felt the actions had actually been carried out.

Appraisals

We are working towards improving career progression through induction, talent identification, talent management and appraisals.

This is in part a response to the staff survey which showed that slightly less than half felt there are opportunities to develop their careers within GNM.

Planned improvements include:Staff focus groups: A number of staff

focus groups are being held to gain a better understanding of the issues around career progression.

Appraisal forms: New appraisal forms will contain sections dedicated to career development.

Inductions: Since April 2008 all staff have received a comprehensive induction programme on the day they join. Induction packs will be improved to include information on how to get specific information and advice.

Coaching and mentoring: We are investigating setting up career development workshops involving staff from across GNM and ways in which mentoring can be introduced at all levels.

Personal development: As part of a talent management initiative across GNM — and more formally linked to appraisals — personal development plans will be put in place in consultation with line managers and the learning and development team.

Career progression

Recruitment

Significant progress has been made to ensure vacancies are openly advertised, recruiting managers are trained properly, and that recruitment and promotion decisions are based on the skills, ability and experience of each candidate.

A process is being introduced, which means vacancies at all levels will be advertised for 14 days. Where an appointment is made without an open recruitment, the editor in chief or chief operating officer must approve an appointment before an offer is made.

All departments have committed to using our online recruitment site to produce more accurate recruitment statistics, and also

monitor the diversity of our applicants and eventual hires (see diversity, page 27).

In the 12 months to August 2008 there were 417 advertised vacancies, with 11,634 applicants, of which approximately 600 were internal applicants. In this period, there were 482 appointments, of which 32% were filled by internal candidates.

While we do not currently have specific data on appointments that were not advertised internally or externally, we believe that they account for under 10% of all positions filled. We are putting measures in place to enable us to provide accurate statistics on this in future.

Fairness and consistency in the way we pay and reward staff continues to be a key focus for GNM and a pay policy has been introduced, and is available to staff on the company intranet, Spike.

Equal pay audit: An independent equal pay audit showed that, when comparing the salaries of men and women performing broadly the same job at GNM, there was no evidence of systemic gender inequality in pay. Furthermore the gap between the average salary of all men compared with all women (regardless of their roles within the organisation) was significantly below the national pay gap, demonstrating that there is a relatively even spread of women and men throughout all levels of the organisation apart from senior management and director level where women are under-represented (see staff diversity, page 27).

Applying our pay policy: A commitment has been made to try to rectify any significant gaps between employees doing similar roles within the next five years through a more rigorous application of the pay policy and the use of internal and external benchmarking data when salary decisions are made.

Editorial pay audit: A general pay audit is also being carried out across editorial in 2008 to ensure that people doing like-roles on different platforms are fairly paid. This will inform the April 2009 pay negotiations with the National Union of Journalists (see union view, page 23).

Reviews in commercial: Directors now have all of the salary information for their departments together with benchmarking data from an external media salary survey carried out by Towers Perrin, where available. They also have internal benchmarking information for employees within GNM who perform the same role so that they can ensure that they apply the pay policy fairly and consistently.

Benefits package: As well as the standard benefits of pensions and healthcare, an extended leave policy has been introduced. We are looking at cost-effective ways to enhance the benefits package and to communicate it more effectively to our staff.

Pay reviews

I am proud to work at GNM

%

The need to changeI understand the reasons why GNM is restructuring the business

%Not sure

12

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

6

Agree/Agree strongly

82

I think the way GNM is restructuring thebusiness is being fairly handled

%Not sure

43

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

15

Agree/Agree strongly

42

Not sure

9

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

2

Agree/Agree strongly

89

Positive Scores

I understand how my pay is determined

%

My immediate manager gives me regular feedback on their work performance

%Not sure

26

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

30

Agree/Agree strongly

44

There are opportunities for me to develop my career at GNM

%Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

29

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

41

Agree/Agree strongly

32

Negative Scores

GNM takes active steps to encourage greater diversity in its workforce

%

The culture in GNM is inclusive

%Not sure

39

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

17

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

32

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

12

Agree/Agree strongly

56

People: diversity

I am proud to work at GNM

%

The need to changeI understand the reasons why GNM is restructuring the business

%Not sure

12

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

6

Agree/Agree strongly

82

I think the way GNM is restructuring thebusiness is being fairly handled

%Not sure

43

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

15

Agree/Agree strongly

42

Not sure

9

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

2

Agree/Agree strongly

89

Positive Scores

I understand how my pay is determined

%

My immediate manager gives me regular feedback on their work performance

%Not sure

26

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

30

Agree/Agree strongly

44

There are opportunities for me to develop my career at GNM

%Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

29

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

41

Agree/Agree strongly

32

Negative Scores

GNM takes active steps to encourage greater diversity in its workforce

%

The culture in GNM is inclusive

%Not sure

39

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

17

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

32

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

12

Agree/Agree strongly

56

People: diversity

I am proud to work at GNM

%

The need to changeI understand the reasons why GNM is restructuring the business

%Not sure

12

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

6

Agree/Agree strongly

82

I think the way GNM is restructuring thebusiness is being fairly handled

%Not sure

43

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

15

Agree/Agree strongly

42

Not sure

9

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

2

Agree/Agree strongly

89

Positive Scores

I understand how my pay is determined

%

My immediate manager gives me regular feedback on their work performance

%Not sure

26

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

30

Agree/Agree strongly

44

There are opportunities for me to develop my career at GNM

%Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

29

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

41

Agree/Agree strongly

32

Negative Scores

GNM takes active steps to encourage greater diversity in its workforce

%

The culture in GNM is inclusive

%Not sure

39

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

17

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

32

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

12

Agree/Agree strongly

56

People: diversity

EditorialLeading liberal voice

26

PeopleDiversity

Reflecting our societyGNM is constantly seeking ways in which to fulfil its commitment to diversity in terms of staff recruitment, editorial coverage and accessibility. There has been modest progress this year, but some areas need more work

G iven our editorial commitment to addressing issues such as social and racial inequalities in the UK and internationally, it is no surprise that diversity and inclusiveness are taken

seriously within GNM. As a business, we want to create a virtuous

circle, whereby increased diversity and equality of opportunity among our staff will enhance our content, products and services.

Beyond our offices, we are using our purchasing power through the products and services we buy to spread sound equality practice and create opportunities for minority‑owned businesses.

Board diversity champion Emily Bell, director of digital content, says that although there are a number of changes under way, progress has been slow.

Bell wrote about diversity in one of her Media Guardian columns, citing Pat Younge, former head of BBC sports programmes and planning, who said “diversity targets should be like financial targets: you don’t hit them, you get fired. I have to say that as board champion for diversity at Guardian News & Media I would currently be firing myself and most of the board for some missed targets. But Younge is right: diversity targets are not just a feelgood add‑on, they are vital to the health of any media business.”

In our staff survey, just over half of staff agreed that GNM takes active steps to encourage greater diversity in its workforce, with only 12% actively disagreeing.

But a smaller 44% feel the culture is inclusive, with nearly a fifth of staff disagreeing.

To improve our performance, all managers are now asked to create a diversity action plan, with progress linked to annual bonus payments. A total of 137 diversity objectives were set last year across the business, over half of which have been completed and a further 29% are under way.

Bell reviews overall progress with the board twice a year and chairs the equality and diversity steering group, which over the past year has created four cross‑functional task forces to address recruitment and inclusion, retention and inclusion, products and content, and supplier diversity.

To keep diversity issues uppermost in people’s minds, all new starters receive equality and diversity training and we held a diversity week, with a third of staff participating in a range of activities. In 2009, this week will be repeated, supported by an increased range of diversity activities throughout the year.

Diversity is particularly important in editorial departments because of the need to reflect the breadth of society within our content.

Board diversity champion Emily Bell, in her Media Guardian column, criticised the lack of diversity within the media industry, writing that “the media should be deeply concerned about this un-diversity, not because it represents moral turpitude on our part, but because it represents bloody awful business sense. What is happening to the UK population at the moment? It is ethnically diversifying and ageing … How can you hope to address audiences for which you have no instinctive feel, and towards which you show casual discrimination?”

To support change across the industry, GNM held an Ethnic Media Summit in autumn 2008. This conference concentrated on a wide range of editorial, commercial and strategic challenges and opportunities, such as how to engage effectively with minority ethnic audiences.

Our annual survey of readers and web users shows a steady increase in the percentage who think our content reflects our diverse society, but this must be set in the context that only 5% of respondents were minority ethnic readers. The most notable increase was the 52% of readers (38% in 2006) who felt the Guardian’s content adequately reflects society in terms of disability.

Feedback from the staff survey shows

This year’s targets

1. See Targets 1 and 3 below. 2. Undertake a strategic review of GNM’s equality and diversity progress to date, identifying future targets that will deliver business critical diversity objectives.

Last year’s targets

1. Directors and heads of departments to deliver on equality and diversity measurable objectives (ongoing target)2. Increase the number of applications for GNM vacancies from under-represented groups: ethnic minorities from 17% to 19% and people with a disability from 1% to 2%

3. Procurement department to ensure that diversity is considered in supplier tender process (ongoing target)

Key = No progress = modest progress = good progress = target completed

Diversity of content

I am proud to work at GNM

%

The need to changeI understand the reasons why GNM is restructuring the business

%Not sure

12

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

6

Agree/Agree strongly

82

I think the way GNM is restructuring thebusiness is being fairly handled

%Not sure

43

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

15

Agree/Agree strongly

42

Not sure

9

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

2

Agree/Agree strongly

89

Positive Scores

I understand how my pay is determined

%

My immediate manager gives me regular feedback on their work performance

%Not sure

26

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

30

Agree/Agree strongly

44

There are opportunities for me to develop my career at GNM

%Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

29

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

41

Agree/Agree strongly

32

Negative Scores

GNM takes active steps to encourage greater diversity in its workforce

%

The culture in GNM is inclusive

%Not sure

39

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

17

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

32

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

12

Agree/Agree strongly

56

People: diversityI am proud to work at GNM

%

The need to changeI understand the reasons why GNM is restructuring the business

%Not sure

12

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

6

Agree/Agree strongly

82

I think the way GNM is restructuring thebusiness is being fairly handled

%Not sure

43

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

15

Agree/Agree strongly

42

Not sure

9

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

2

Agree/Agree strongly

89

Positive Scores

I understand how my pay is determined

%

My immediate manager gives me regular feedback on their work performance

%Not sure

26

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

30

Agree/Agree strongly

44

There are opportunities for me to develop my career at GNM

%Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

29

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

27

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

41

Agree/Agree strongly

32

Negative Scores

GNM takes active steps to encourage greater diversity in its workforce

%

The culture in GNM is inclusive

%Not sure

39

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

17

Agree/Agree strongly

44

Not sure

32

Disagree/Disagreestrongly

12

Agree/Agree strongly

56

People: diversity

SOURCE: GNM EMPLOYEE SURVEY 2008

27

PeopleDiversity

that there is still substantial concern within editorial about unfair internal job selection, with many complaints about cronyism, thus undermining attempts to improve the diversity of staff.

Improvements are being made to improve transparency of recruitment in editorial. Alan Rusbridger, editor in chief of GNM, has committed to advertise all vacancies and now regularly communicates how appointments were filled, as well as the diversity of applicants and those subsequently employed.

In a further effort to nurture journalistic talent from ethnic minorities, GNM’s owner, the Scott Trust reorganised it’s bursary and internship scheme, concentrating on those from a minority ethnic background

who also face financial hardship. Ten postgraduate bursaries are offered

each year for newspaper, online and broadcast journalism, a year-long paid internship has been created with Guardian Films, and the trust funds five NCTJ (National Council for the Training of Journalists) journalism diversity bursaries. See gmgplc.co.uk/scotttrust.

The Guardian separately offers 12 Positive Action work placements for journalism students or graduates from ethnic minorities (gnmcareers.co.uk). Our HR department now contacts Positive Action alumni when entry-level editorial positions come up. Job alerts are also sent to Aspire, a membership organisation of aspiring minority ethnic journalists.

Progress on increasing the diversity of our staff has so far been modest (see graphic), although in the last year the proportion of employees from a minority ethnic background increased from 9% to 10%.

To attract job applications from minority groups, we have been working with the main recruitment agencies who promote job vacancies for our advertising and technology departments, which have the largest percentage of vacancies. We have assessed our preferred suppliers on their commitment to diversity and they have agreed to provide us with an ethnically representative shortlist for vacancies.

In 2009 we will also be focusing on increasing the number of staff with disabilities and the number of women in senior positions. Both women and minority ethnic staff are currently under-represented at director and senior manager level.

On disability, we are a Two Ticks employer which means we actively welcome people with disabilities to work for the company. This includes a commitment to interview all disabled job applicants who meet the minimum criteria and, once employed, ensuring that people with disabilities are offered appropriate support. As part of this recruitment drive, we have run articles in Able magazine and are a featured employer on youreable.com.

To keep up to speed with developing adaptive technologies for those with disabilities, a new position has been created to advise on how such technologies can help with interviewing or employing people with disabilities. Training in deaf awareness has been provided, and a British Sign Language course is now included in our subsidised language programme for staff.

GNM has also been participating in a project called Disability Working which encourages unemployed people with disabilities back into the world of work through placements and employment.

Our efforts are beginning to bear fruit

with an increase over the past year in the proportion of GNM job applicants and successful candidates from minority ethnic groups and those with a disability (see graphic). The board receives monthly recruitment updates, which include a breakdown by ethnicity and disability.

On the issue of retention, we have been looking at how to support women to remain at GNM as well as develop their careers. Flexible working is clearly a priority and in the past year, 91 flexible working requests were made, three-quarters by women; 80% were agreed, which takes the percentage of GNM staff working flexibly to 15%.

Readers with disabilities While our newspapers have traditionally been available through the Talking Newspaper Association, the recent redesign of guardian.co.uk placed a priority on ensuring accessibility, in particular for people with visual impairments.

We worked with the Shaw Trust’s web accessibility team, who all have a disability themselves, to test new page templates using adaptive technologies. Any problems they identified were then fed back to the design team, thus ensuring better standards than solely relying on compliance with W3C accessibility guidelines.

Spring 2008 saw the introduction of a new commenting and community system across guardian.co.uk. In order to meet launch deadlines, the interface chosen for this relies on javascript, which means reduced accessibility for some readers. While testing was undertaken using various screenreaders, and necessary adjustments made, we are working towards a solution which doesn’t rely on javascript, which would greatly improve accessibility. This will also have the side benefit of increasing access to our community function from mobile devices and search engines.

Beyond guardian.co.uk, our commercial department adheres to an accessibility process with all new and existing third‑party sites. They are provided with an accessibility checklist which emphasises compliance with W3C standards.

Staff diversity

SOURCE: NRS APRIL 07 - MARCH 08 BASE = ALL WHO ANSWERED ETHNICITY QUESTION

Ethnic diversity

Ethnic diversity of quality newspaperreaders in the UK, ethnic minorities %

Daily Telegraph

Financial Times

The Guardian

The Independent

The Times

The Independent on Sunday

The Observer

Sunday Telegraph

The Sunday Times

5

21

1116

8

139

59

0

10

20

30

40

    Disabled applicants

Disabled hires

Mixed ethnicMinority applicants

Mixed ethnicMinority hires

Disabled applicants

Disabled hires

Mixed ethnicMinority applicants

Mixed ethnicMinority hires

50

SOURCE: GNM E-RECRUITMENT

Diversity of GNM staff % of staff

Recruitment diversity at GNM

2007

2008

40

30

20

10

0

SOURCE: GNM DIVERSITY MONITORING 2003-8

2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

Disability

Mixed and ethnic minority

Female

1%

0%

17%

10%

2%

0.48%

18%

12%

Coli

n S

haw

/an

gli

a Pr

eSS

agen

Cy

28

OperationsOur ambition is to be environmentally regenerative. We will investigate how we can become carbon positive — go beyond carbon neutral and positively affect climate change

Environmentally regenerativeOur commitment to improving GNM’s environmental performance will test our ingenuity, but it is the only way to be sure of progress

29

OperationsSustainabiliy strategy

O ur ambition to be environmentally regenerative came out of a six-month partnership with sustainability charity Forum for the Future, which was

framed around how sustainability could support the future success of GNM.

The commitment was made even though there was no way to be certain that becoming environmentally regenerative is possible. This is because we wanted to commit to a challenge that would test our ingenuity.

We didn’t want to aim for carbon neutrality because we felt it had already been tainted by companies rushing to meet this target, sometimes for marketing advantage and often by the lazy route of offsetting, rather than looking for reductions or to avoid the emissions in the first place.

We also wanted to have a broader definition to ensure that our influence with our readers and suppliers could be brought into the equation, recognising that we can have an impact in those areas as well as at our own offices and print sites.

A recent report produced by Forum and the American NGO Clean Air Cool Planet called Getting to Zero echoed our approach, concluding that the “dynamic, fluid nature of the concept [carbon neutrality] also means that it may well be more intellectually honest to aspire to neutrality rather than to claim it.

“Changing expectations over time will push the company in question to continually improve its performance and to engage with its suppliers and customers to help them reduce their emissions.

“If we accept that neutrality is a fluid target, then transparency about what is, and what is not, covered by a claim becomes absolutely essential. Companies should anticipate and be prepared for considerable scrutiny from stakeholders.”

A year ago we realised while we were developing a strategy around our editorial and commercial operations, we had not been giving sufficient attention to our operational performance. In fact, areas such as waste management in our offices, would not have held up well to scrutiny by our stakeholders.

To rectify this, environmental manager Claire Buckley was appointed in summer 2008. She has been concentrating on reviewing GNM’s environmental performance and establishing a process of continual improvement.

Her initial review has resulted in a more complete carbon footprint for our offices and print sites (see graphic), as well as in the identification of the key steps we need to take to develop a comprehensive carbon strategy which will put us on the road to being carbon positive. We are aiming for external verification of our direct carbon footprint in 2009. Work has also begun on our indirect carbon footprint, focusing on our paper supply and newspaper distribution network (see page 31).

A number of other changes have taken

place over the past year that will have an impact on our operations. These include a change in the management structure of our two newspaper print sites. Trafford Park Printers in Manchester, which had been a 50% joint venture beween Guardian Media Group (GMG) and the Telegraph Group, came under our full ownership in October 2008 and we had earlier taken over the management of the Guardian Print Centre in East London. Bringing together the different environmental approaches of these two operations will be a priority.

0.3Offices landfill waste39 tCO2

48.0Print sites electricity6,853 tCO2

30.9Offices electricity

4,402 tCO2

5.6Offices gas

800 tCO2

12.2Business travel

1,733 tCO2

%3.1Print sites gas445 tCO2

CarbonStrategy

Measure &monitor CO2

Reduce

Offset

Communicate

Review

•Compensate for emissionswhich can’t be eliminated•Ensure high-quality transparent carbon offsets

•Be transparent aboutmethod and scope•Report internallyand externally

•Review results in light of changes in activities and externalrequirements and developments

•Avoid carbon intensive activities•Be more energy efficient•Replace high carbon energysources with low/zero-carbonalternatives

•Baseline emissions monitoring•Recognised standards•External verification

Key elements of our carbon strategy

Carbon footprint of GNM offices and print sitesApril 2007 - March 2008

GNM'S CARBON FOOTPRINT HAS BEEN CALCULATED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE GREENHOUSE GAS PROTOCOL’S CORPORATE ACCOUNTING AND REPORTING STANDARD AND DEFRA 2008 GUIDELINES. IT COVERS THE FOLLOWING:OFFICES: our three main offices PRINT SITES: Guardian Print Centre and 50% of emissions from Trafford Park Printers (TPP). TPP was under joint GMG-Telegraph ownership during the reporting period, but from October 2008 it moved to 100% GNM ownership.BUSINESS TRAVEL: approximately 65% of GNM staff air travel emissions have been calculated from data provided by our main supplier. We have added 35% to this to estimate the carbon for total air travel. The footprint also includes company car fuel use, but not trains or taxis. WASTE: landfill from our offices GAS: from our offices and print sites ELECTRICITY: for 2006-7 we calculated zero carbon emissions for our renewable electricity, according to DEFRA reporting guidelines. DEFRA have since changed the rules and we now calculate C02 for our renewable electricity based on the electricity grid average.

Total14,272 tCO2

EditorialLeading liberal voice

30

OperationsSustainability strategy

Last year’s targets

Produce an independently verified carbon footprint for our direct carbon emissions, and 1. provide more accurate information on GNM’s indirect emissions resulting from newspaper production and distribution Monitor the progress and environmental performance at our newspaper and magazine 2. printsites based on recommendations produced by the Carbon Trust and CSRnetwork.

Undertake a comparative lifecycle analysis of bioplastic versus regular polythene, to give 3. clarity around the environmental impacts of polybagging weekend newspapers. Appoint an environmental manager 4. Research the issues surrounding carbon emissions associated with paper manufacture 5. Improve the percentage of recycled paper in our magazine supplies subject to issues of 6. quality and availability

Progressively increase certified fibre content of virgin paper to 70% over five years 7. Carry out a feasibility study looking at full chain-of-custody certification for individual 8. publications by end of 2008

Key = no progress = modest progress = good progress = target completed

Strengthen our process of continual environmental improvement, including 1. environmental objectives, indicators and management reportingDevelop our carbon reduction strategy and road map towards being carbon positive2. Measure the carbon footprint of the paper we purchase (by end of 2009)3. Increase the certified content of virgin magazine paper to 90% by 20124. Support our two print sites in jointly developing new environmental improvement 5. programmesEstablish sustainability measures within procurement and business travel6. Raise staff engagement and awareness levels of GNM’s sustainability commitments 7. and performance.

This year’s targets

Carbon reduction We concentrated in 2008 on various actions to reduce emissions through energy-efficiency and replace high-carbon energy sources with sustainable alternatives.

We are confident that our new headquarters building in King’s Cross will be significantly more energy efficient than the old 1960s office we move out of at the end of 2008 and will measure the changes in order to get the full benefits from the new site.

The building uses renewable energy as does our other office in Clerkenwell. Our energy intensive London print site GPC also switched to a renewable energy contract in October 2008.

Our Manchester print site (TPP) is currently locked into a brown energy contract, which does not come up for renewal for two years, but it has created an energy policy and embarked on a comprehensive reduction plan (see page 32 for details of energy efficiency plans).

The GNM technology department has improved the energy efficiency of our IT infrastructure, reducing the number of servers in our data centres from 150 to just five, as well as installing intelligent power units. This has resulted in a 2% reduction in overall server energy consumption.

Acknowledging there are carbon emissions we cannot avoid, from 2009 we will be mitigating them through partnerships with three organisations:• Sandbag campaigns to remove carbon permits that allow big business to carry on polluting as well buying permits to retire them from the system (sandbag.org.uk).• The C-Change Trust runs the Carbon Busters programme where pupils create ways to reduce their schools’ carbon footprint. We will be working with C-Change to invest in schools around our King’s Cross office (thec-changetrust.org).• The Converging World invests in clean energy in India. Profits go directly into creating sustainable communities there (theconvergingworld.org).

The various projects across GNM are taking place within the framework of a Carbon Management Project across all divisions of our parent company Guardian Media Group (GMG), with the support of the Carbon Trust. Its aim is to measure the carbon footprint of the six divisions and then seek significant reductions.

dav

id l

even

e

Sustainability is at the heart of procurement Photo: Natalie Behring/Panos Pictures

31

OperationsNewspaper production

Printing process

A s part of restructuring for the digital age, GNM has embarked on a strategic review of all aspects of our newspapers, with sustainability being one of

five key workstreams.A senior member of the strategy and

corporate development department is heading up the review, looking at the issues of paper, printing and distribution.

As part of a much longer-term visioning exercise, GNM has formed a partnership with HP Labs, the research arm of Hewlett Packard, to do research into the future of sustainable newspaper and magazine printing.

This will concentrate on developing print-on-demand technologies that will allow more localised publishing rather than relying on our current large-scale print sites and road-based distribution system.

PaperOur vision states that “sustainability will be at the heart of our procurement processes,” in recognition that our suppliers are integral to our operational impact.

Nowhere is this more important than in the near 200,000 tonnes of paper purchased annually for our parent company GMG’s publications. Over half of this is used for the Guardian and Observer.

The production of paper is by far our biggest contributor to emissions, with research by the Carbon Trust estimating that it accounted for around three-quarters of the total carbon footprint of the Daily Mirror — a figure that would be roughly comparable for our papers.

The thinking around responsible paper purchasing is rapidly evolving. From an initial focus on increasing the percentage of recycled paper and ensuring virgin newsprint comes from certified sources, the boundaries have broadened to include establishing the carbon footprint of newsprint manufacture.

GMG’s paper purchaser now has sustainability targets within his annual personal objectives, and in the coming year is looking to measure the footprint of the paper we buy, in order to see how to reduce it. This is a difficult exercise as there is no single agreed measurement tool being used by

the industry and the paper chain is complex, given that individual mills often buy pulp from several different countries.

Independent consultancy CSRnetwork has for the past three years been auditing our paper supplies. In its latest report, the consultancy asked our suppliers if they have taken steps to measure the carbon footprint of their paper.

Six of the 16 said they had, and a number referred to an industry-wide initiative being undertaken by CEPI (Confederation of European paper Industries), which is intended to provide consistent guidelines for reporting the carbon profile of pulp and paper making. This is the system we are planning to use in our analysis and will be encouraging all suppliers to use the same methodology.

CSRnetwork reports that progress was made during 2007 in increasing both the proportion of recycled fibre and the certified virgin fibre content of paper, in line with our paper policy.

Recycled content for newsprint increased to 86% for GMG and 94% for GNM (87%, 2006), while recycled fibre in magazines rose in GMG publications to 13% and those produced by GNM to 18%.

The main use of virgin paper occurs in our magazines. The proportion that was certified increased during 2007 to 64% for GMG and 62% for GNM magazines. This is in line with our 2007 target, although this has now been made more ambitious with a commitment to increase the certified content of virgin magazine paper to 90% by 2012.

In newsprint, the percentage of certified virgin fibre dropped slightly in 2007, but given this is such a small portion of the total, CSRnetwork concluded that “the fall in the certification rate may therefore not be significant in terms of the overall sustainability of supply, set against the imperative to use as much recycled fibre as possible in this grade.”

CSRnetwork also gathers data on the paper mills themselves and found that the great majority of mills that supplied GMG in 2007 operate environmental management systems independently certified to the international standards ISO 14001 or EMAS. All mills are also using chlorine-free technologies for bleaching.

Sustainability will be at the heart of our procurement processes

The efforts GNM has made so far is helping to make our newspaper and magazine printing and distribution ever more sustainable

GMG 2006 GNM 2006 GMG 2007 GNM 2007

83%87% 86%

91%

SOURCE: CSR NETWORK REPORT 2008

Paper supply

Proportion of fibre that is either recycledor certified (all paper grades) %

EditorialLeading liberal voice

32

OperationsNewspaper production

A small number of high risks were flagged in the last report, in particular concerning the environmental practices and certification levels of our two Russian paper suppliers that provide small quantities of newsprint to GMG.

Both suppliers have, however, now recognised the importance of having procedures in place to ensure their virgin fibre is sourced legally and responsibly. They have also embarked on certification initiatives, although currently achieve a combined certification rate of less than 20%.

Another target we set ourselves last year was to see whether we could achieve chain-of-custody (c-o-c) certification on any of our individual products.

C-o-c certification gives an extra level of confidence because it assures that products from certified forests are not mixed with products from uncertified forests at any point in the supply chain.

For both the Guardian and Observer magazines, we now have c-o-c certification from the moment the tree is felled to the point where the paper arrives at the print site. The final step, which we are currently working towards, is for our print sites to assure that they are using that same paper in our magazines.

Beyond sustainable purchasing, we can also reduce the environmental impact on paper by reducing its weight and the amount we use. Following changes to our presses in 2008, we were able to reduce the weight of our newspapers, from 49 gsm to 45 gsm without a noticeable reduction in quality.

GNM print sites The largest contributors to GNM’s direct operational carbon footprint, accounting for half or our emissions, are our two newspaper print sites.

Therefore energy reduction at these plants can have a significant effect on our direct emissions.

Trafford Park Printers (TPP) has laid strong foundations for reducing energy consumption and increasing efficiency.

Notable actions include a switch-off campaign to help staff identify which lighting and machinery can be switched off when not in use and the replacement of old lighting with more efficient motion-sensitive lighting in parts of the site.

TPP plans to apply for certification to the new Carbon Trust Standard by the end of 2008, for which evidence of carbon management performance and emissions reduction will be independently audited.

Our London print site GPC has implemented energy-efficiency measures, but not yet on the same scale as TPP. It is developing its energy monitoring system and planning to initiate a switch-off campaign similar to that at the Manchester site.

In last year’s audit, we reported data from a Carbon Trust report showing that gas usage at GPC was 4.6 million kwH for 2006/07. A new monitoring system has shown that this figure was wrongly recorded. The usage for

2007/08 was 108,000 kwH.Of course it’s not all just about carbon.

GPC achieved certification to ISO 14001 in January 2008. This certification means that GPC has an environmental management system (EMS) in place which will help it to improve its environmental performance on an on-going basis.

Both print sites have made progress in preventing and recycling waste, in particular packaging waste and printing waste (paper, plates, chemicals). TPP aims to achieve zero waste to landfill over the next few years, with a small part of the waste being incinerated with energy recovery. TPP has already halved its overall waste disposal costs and reduced press waste by 50% in 2007, saving 1,600 tonnes of paper.

Together with the print sites, we are working on identifying future improvement measures, focusing on areas where the print sites can work together and developing common key performance indicators. The results of this work will be fed into the newspaper sustainability strategy group (see page 31).

Magazine print sitesSince our last report, Trader Media Group’s Apple Web plant, which is majority controlled by our parent company, GMG, and prints our Saturday Guide magazine, has achieved the ISO 14001 certified environmental management system. This has involved Apple Web putting in place measures and targets for monitoring

Reducing the weight of our newspapers, but maintaining the quality Photo: Sarah Lee

33

OperationsNewspaper production

continued improvement in its environmental performance.

With the closure of Quebecor, which was highlighted in last year’s report as being the least efficient of our contract printing sites, the contract has now moved to Polestar, which now accounts for three-quarters of our magazine products. Its site in Sheffield, which prints Guardian Weekend magazine, opened in 2006 with modern, efficient presses and state-of-the-art environmental controls and has been awarded ISO 1400.

Polestar recently launched a website, with support from the Carbon Trust, which allows customers to calculate the carbon footprint of their products to enable them to make more informed decisions about their product format and design.

Polestar is also making this software available to competitors in the hope that this will help the industry in agreeing a common standard.

DistributionOur distribution company CEVA Logistics is another large contributor to our indirect carbon emissions, given that its lorries travel up and down the country delivering our newspapers and most of our magazines.

CEVA is measuring its carbon emissions using a web-based data capture tool, which will allow us from January 2009 to understand our distribution footprint and set reduction targets through fuel-efficiency drives and use of new transport technologies.

The science of sustainability can be incredibly complex, as we found out when we investigated how to create a more environmentally-friendly wrapping to our weekend papers.

We have become increasingly ill at ease about the use of see-through polybags, even though commercially they are essential given the need to hold together our multi-sectioned weekend papers and the insistence of some of our supermarket clients to have our publications ready bundled.

The current polywrap is made from 100% polythene and as such is a type 2 recyclable material, but it is difficult finding recycling places, other than supermarkets that offer plastic bag recycling.

Our readers too have consistently been unhappy with the current practice with 92% saying in our reader survey that it is important the plastic is made of recycled material or is biodegradable.

Prince Charles joined the debate, writing to the chief executive of our parent company GMG in April 2008, to ask if we “have any cunning ideas about how this practice could be altered. Otherwise the Pacific Ocean will become even more clogged up!”

We had already been working on switching to alternative bio-plastics made from potato or corn starch, commissioning a lifecycle analysis of the environmental impact of polybagging in 2007.

Following an inconclusive initial report, a secondary study was commissioned which suggested that unless disposed of in the correct way through composting, bio-plastics would be more harmful to the environment than regular plastic wrapping due to the emission of harmful greenhouse gasses, including methane, when disposed of through landfill.

This information led to our environment editor writing a front page splash on the dangers of these plastics, which are used by many supermarkets for wrapping food products.

While continuing to investigate an alternative, we have in the meantime taken action on our existing plastic wrap, by reducing its thickness by 20%. We have also successfully tested the use of 25% recycled polythene and hope to roll this out in 2009.

Polybagging

Case study

GeT

TY iM

aGeS

EditorialLeading liberal voice

The new building

34

GNM will introduce a host of environmental measures to further boost Kings Place’s sustainability credentials

OperationsOffices

O ur decision to move to Kings Place, a brand new office and public arts development in King’s Cross was inspired by the building’s sustainability credentials. These included

its environmental quality and location near the capital’s principal public transport hub.

The building itself has several energy-efficient features. The facade helps to keep the building cool in summer, while in the winter it retains the heat, reducing the need for air conditioning and heating. It also has a displacement ventilation system that uses fresh air to cool the building, largely reducing the need for refrigerant cooling. It is currently awaiting confirmation of its rating under the Building Research Establishment Environment Assessment Method (Breeam), a well-regarded environmental rating system for buildings. It is expected to achieve a “very good” rating. (There are four possible ratings: pass, good, very good and excellent.) The building is also due to be issued its Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) by the end of the year. All new homes and commercial buildings must have an EPC. The A-G rating, similar to the energy labels for fridges, is awarded depending on the level of energy efficiency.

Recycling and wasteThe move to our new Kings Place offices has resulted in getting rid of large amounts of furniture, IT equipment and other materials, we have accumulated over our 32 years occupancy in Farringdon Road. To ensure the majority was reused or recycled rather than sent to landfill, we teamed up with various charities and social businesses who collected different components.

Most of our IT equipment is leased so will be returned to the supplier, with the rest being donated, either to our local community partners (see Communities, page 41) or to Digital Links which refurbish kit for reuse in developing countries. For smaller miscellaneous items, staff were encouraged to use a range of recycling and charity donation options.

While the recent move has been generating unusually large quantities of waste, figures for the 2007/08 financial year (which do not include the move) have shown a 12% reduction in waste to landfill over the past two years and a similar reduction in the total waste we produce. Currently one-third of all our waste is recycled (see graphic).

There is considerable scope to improve

our waste systems. A number of waste streams which are separated and recycled or reused are not regularly reported on, such as batteries and fluorescent lighting, and we have not been composting food waste or degradable packaging, which is more damaging than ordinary plastic if it goes to landfill. (see polybagging case study page 33)

Despite providing separate recycling bins for cans and plastic bottles in our offices, we discovered during 2008 that these had actually being going to landfill.

We are currently working on a new waste management and monitoring system for our offices to ensure this does not happen again.

We aim to increase the recycling rate and achieve zero to landfill by 2010. We are also committed to ensuring that all waste is recycled and treated in the UK rather than being exported.

At Kings Place, waste separation hubs are being provided on all floors for paper, cans, plastic bottles and general waste. In addition there will be recycling facilities for glass, CDs, DVDs and batteries. We also hope to introduce food waste and biodegradable packaging composting. A new waste management system will also be introduced at our other existing London office.

TransportTravel makes up 12% of GNM’s operational carbon footprint, of which the vast majority results from air travel.

This is not surprising given that we have hundreds of journalists covering news across the globe. While the quality of our reporting is paramount, we will be looking at how best to reduce travel impacts right across the business in the coming year. Our plans to increase the number of writers overseas should also help us to reduce reduce the number of flights.

We hope to make the most of the excellent travel links to King’s Cross by encouraging staff to take greener transport decisions for their journeys and to use the state of the art video-conferencing.

While we had hoped to have comprehensive travel data on staff air and rail travel via our new travel supplier in time for this report, major delays in finalising the contract have stalled this. The contract is now in place and we are working with the supplier to monitor all air and rail travel in 2009. For offsetting purposes, we are therefore using the data we do have for air travel which accounts for approximately two-thirds of our estimated total emissions,

*THESE FIGURES COVER LANDFILL WASTE FROM 2 OF GNM’S 3 MAIN OFFICEBUILDINGS IN LONDON AS WELL AS PAPER, CARDBOARD AND GLASSRECYCLED.

Office recycling and waste*

Tonnes

168 recycled 176

recycled

357land-filled

Total: 561Total: 537

Total: 489

369land-filled 313

land-filled

204 recycled

2005 - 2006 2006 - 2007 2007 - 2008

The atrium of Kings Place Photo: David Levene

Staff engagementOne area where we have consistently been weak has been in communicating and engaging our staff on sustainability issues. This is reflected by poor scores in the recent employee survey (see graphic below left).

This has partly been due to the lack of coherent environmental information to communicate, as well as the environmentally unfriendly infrastructure of our old offices.

The appointment of a new environment manager means GNM is now able to commit to developing a more systematic and transparent process of continual improvement, and the move to more efficient offices provides staff with a setting more conducive to good environmental practice.

Motivating and engaging our staff has been made a priority for the year ahead, with several actions already identified. These include bringing to life our internal sustainability brand, “TomorrowToday”, raising awareness of our sustainability vision, and organising a sustainability week.

Office procurementGNM’s long-term goal is to deal not only with our direct environmental and social impacts, but also those from the products and services we consume. While newsprint and magazine paper has by far the biggest carbon footprint in our supply chain (see page 31), we are also making sure that sustainability is considered by all our centralised office suppliers.

Our first key priority has been to ensure that sustainability has been fully considered in the multi-million pound fit-out of Kings Place.

The fit-out has been managed by Overbury, which has an ISO 14001 certified environmental management system (EMS). It managed to achieve a waste recycling rate by August 2008, in the midst of the fit-out, of an impressive 92%, well above the initial target of 55%. The use of certified timber has also been maximised guaranteeing that the wood comes from responsibly managed forests and is not from endangered species nor illegally felled.

The fit-out was registered with Considerate Constructors Scheme (CCS), an initiative which monitors projects against criteria designed to encourage best practice for the environment, the workforce and the general public. It achieved 37 out of 40 after the final CCS inspection and was endorsed as “an exceptionally good site”.

Managing director Tim Brooks says Overbury was just one example of the way tenders were negotiated for Kings Place: “What has been interesting about some of

35

OperationsOffices

and adding one-third to this to get a final total estimate.

We continue to monitor and offset fuel used by our 63 company cars, as well as that claimed on expenses. The past year has seen a 16% reduction on the previous reporting period in resulting emissions from business car travel.

GNM also uses the sustainable taxi firm, Green Tomato Cars as one of two centralised taxi services. They use only hybrid cars and offset all their emissions. We will work with our other taxi provider in 2009 to obtain data on the related carbon emissions.

GNM’s cycling group has been consulted on provision for cyclists at our new offices, which will be a marked improvement on existing facilities. There will be secure covered space for 190 bicycles and 20 motorbikes, as well as showers and lockers nearby. Only three car spaces have been allocated in order to maximise the space available for bicycles.

In addition, GNM is paying Camden council to install bike racks on York Way right next to Kings Place, and our landlord is looking at proposals to site more cycle parking around the building’s perimeter.

We have also signed up to the government’s Cycle to Work initiative that gives employees the chance to buy a tax-free bike through their payroll, cutting the cost by up to half. Eighty employees took part last year, and more are expected to sign up when it is offered to staff again.

There is secured covered parking space for 190 bicycles

%%

Disagree

19

Agree

55Agree

42

Disagree

26

%

SOURCE: GNM EMPLOYEE SURVEY 2008

What our staff think

GNM as an organisation has effective environmental practices(eg recycling, energy saving etc)

GNM encourages me to take anactive part in reducing my ownenvironmental impact at work

I understand the implications ofGNM’s sustainability vision formy area of responsibility

Disagree

30

Not sure

38Not sure

32

Not sure

26

Agree

32

The atrium of Kings Place Photo: David Levene

EditorialLeading liberal voice

36

OperationsOffices

our tendering processes is the companies say they have learned more from us than any other. The catering contract is a good example. Not only did we involve our own experts, such as investigations writer Felicity Lawrence, but on an issue like pay, we made it clear right from the beginning that we were not interested in the minimum wage but in the London working wage (see Catering contract below).

“For the fit-out we talked to three of the biggest companies in the UK. For us it was not a price-driven decision, but was all about the way they would manage the site and the materials being used. Overbury was head and shoulders above the rest. It was very noticeable the difference between a true environmental bid and the ones that had had a environmentally friendly sticking plaster put on. You learn quickly about whether companies genuinely care about the environment,” explains Brooks.

In next year’s Living our values we will publish final volumes of certified timber used in the fit-out, as well as total waste and recycling. Some of this data will contribute to the carbon footprint of the fit-out being collated by Overbury. Overbury also worked with Islington council to source

potential local suppliers and resources.Sustainability was also important in

the procurement of new furniture for Kings Place. Wherever possible, it uses recycled and recyclable materials and the manufacturers have their own initiatives in place to minimise the environmental impact of their operations, transport and packaging.

Our technology and procurement teams have done a great deal of work on choosing new computing and other IT kit which is both energy efficient and also promotes more sustainable office behaviours.

The energy consumption of our existing desktop computers was monitored to serve as a benchmark for evaluating the energy consumption of new equipment.

While Apple is not reputed for its environmental performance, our publishing system requires Macs for 60% of staff. The remainder use PCs, which were supplied by Hewlett Packard, a manufacturer that is considered to be progressive on environmental issues.

The technology department also commissioned a print audit to determine the specifications for new printing and copying equipment. The audit showed that, while we have a lower than average use of paper overall (315 pages per month per employee versus a benchmark of 1,000 in similar industries), only 7% of our printing is double-sided and we have a higher than average level of printing from email and internet. The audit results provided an important basis for choosing the new printing equipment.

From 2009 we will have an improved system to monitor all printing and copying by department. The new equipment will be set automatically to double-sided.

The procurement department has also been working on tenders for cleaning and postal services supported by our new environmental manager, to ensure sustainability criteria and performance have been integrated into the process.

Felicity Lawrence Investigations writer specialising in food, the Guardian

I was initially reluctant to be drawn into the GNM catering contract negotiations, partly because of something that the deputy governor of one of Britain’s largest prisons said during an interview which has always stuck in my mind. “You can change quite a lot and not have trouble, but get the food wrong and you’ll have a riot”.

But with the move to Kings Place, GNM wanted to make the tendering process as democratic as possible. Representatives from several departments formed a sub-committee to choose the new supplier, supported by procurement consultants appointed by our facilities team.

We all wanted food that tasted better and was affordable from a contractor who would treat catering staff fairly as they transferred under employment regulations.

As well as the usual tender requirements, we decided to add a detailed specification to ensure that bidders cooked fresh real food. The specification built on work done by the NGO Sustain on what a really sustainable food supply would look like as well as criteria developed for school meals to ensure contractors don’t use short cuts to save money. These projects had shown that companies can tick the boxes on paper around environmental standards and nutritional standards and still produce lousy food that’s not sustainable in the true sense.

To give a flavour of the specification we came up with — the vast majority of food should be prepared on site using fresh

ingredients each day (before sandwiches were for example coming from a large sandwich factory), it should be sourced locally or regionally and directly where possible. A certain percentage of fair trade and organic produce should be provided, which we would aim to increase steadily. Packaging and waste should be recyclable and actually recycled.

We also specified in some detail about food sourcing: meat should be sourced from farms

rearing their livestock on grass, and chicken and pork should be free range and not contain added water or polyphosphates.

There would be no fish on the menu from the Fish to Avoid list of endangered species drawn up by the Marine Stewardship Council.

No food should contain trans fats; all bread should be made without chemical improvers; cakes, sauces and soups should be made from scratch not from pre-mixes and so on. We also wanted catering staff to be put on the London living wage as opposed to the national minimum wage.

The staff team then spent an intense two days visiting all those shortlisted at sites where they were already doing catering. We ate our way through a heroic amount of food, some of it very good, some of it less so.

As a vegan diabetic one of the team was able to test them out on their ability to cater for special dietary needs. Once each company had gone through its sales patter, I asked to look inside their fridges, which proved very revealing.

The company we finally chose, Jill Bartlett, is a small but growing independent, and was the favoured supplier at every stage of the process by unanimous agreement. It was already paying all its staff at all its sites the London living wage, it had clear plans for staff development, and it seemed to have the best understanding of what sustainable food really means. It was already meeting many of the points on our specification; other companies said they were willing to meet them if clients requested them but didn’t seem to have the same commitment.

Sustainability was also important in the procurement of new furniture for Kings Place

Catering contract

Case study

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CommunitiesGNM is investing in local community initiatives as well as supporting projects whose effects are felt around the globe

EditorialLeading liberal voice

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CommunitiesKing’s Cross

As part of its sustainability vision, GNM aims to work with local and global communities to address social and environmental needs and provide volunteers, resources and funding. So how successful have we been this year?

Giving something back

With the constant barrage of information about climate change and environmental degradation, it is easy to see how the human

element of sustainable development is lost.We believe social cohesion and strong

communities are also vital for a sustainable world and have amended our sustainability vision to articulate this more clearly (see page 5).

Although raising awareness and debate around social issues through editorial coverage is the biggest impact we can have (see social justice section, page 14), we recognise that we can also provide significant practical support to the many

communities we are engaged with.On an international scale, this ranges from

leveraging nearly £3m for our editorially-led development project in Uganda (see page 14), to the continuing work of the Guardian Foundation in supporting the development of a free press, primarily in eastern Europe and Africa (see page 42).

A key focus over the past year, however, has been closer to home with the creation of a community strategy ahead of our move to new offices in King’s Cross, London.

King’s CrossWhile King’s Cross is set to become the largest regeneration project in Europe, the wider borough of Islington remains the seventh most deprived local authority in the

UK, while Caledonian ward, directly north of our new offices, is among the country’s 2% most deprived neighbourhoods.

Over the past year, our sustainable development team has been meeting with local community leaders and charitable groups to gain an understanding of the issues local people face, and how we might work with them.

Our strategy is focusing on leadership (both within GNM and the local community), addressing social and environmental needs and getting more staff engaged and involved.

We also recognise the value of volunteering to staff and are working with our training and development department to link community support to business training needs, as well as strengthening staff

GNM volunteers at Camley Street Natural Park Photo: Felix Clay

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CommunitiesKing’s Cross

relationships and networks.We are not interested in only acting

alone but want to see how we can combine forces with other local businesses to share knowledge and ideas to maximise our impact. GNM managing director Tim Brooks told an all-staff briefing in May 2008: “I am determined that we will not live in a bubble at Kings Place and ignore what is going on around us. We have a fantastic opportunity to think hard about how we integrate ourselves into this new community.”

To engage all board directors, Brooks subsequently led a Seeing is Believing visit to see first-hand some of the challenges that local people face and the impact we can have. The visit, facilitated by Business in the Community, included EGA, a secondary school we have been partnering with for seven years, and two new projects; the homeless youth centre New Horizons, and Pentonville prison (see page 40).

Comments from board members following the visit included: “The day has had a profound effect”, “a challenging, thought-provoking, depressing and uplifting experience”, “a reminder to us to set our sights high” and, “all in all, huge amounts we can do, all of which will make a positive impact on the community, so a very energising and uplifting day.”

VolunteeringGNM’s recent staff survey showed a good awareness of the local volunteering initiatives on offer, with three quarters agreeing that GNM offers them the opportunity to get involved with local schools and charities.

All employees will be given a King’s Cross guide detailing our volunteering partnerships, including articles from local community leaders. The guide also lists nearby shops, green spaces, restaurants and sports facilities to encourage staff to spend their money locally. We plan to maintain this awareness-raising, particularly through the diversity and sustainability weeks planned for next year.

Five per cent of staff volunteered in the past year, mainly through our schools’ partnerships. We hope to increase this proportion by diversifying the types of opportunities on offer (see page 40 for details of individual volunteering initiatives).

We get regular feedback from both volunteers and community members which this year was overwhelmingly positive (see graphic, page 39). One teacher said: “We have found the Guardian volunteers to be completely committed to enhancing our children’s understanding of reading and current affairs. Some of these children were disengaged from reading but by talking to them and reading their feedback forms, they now seem more motivated and interested.”

SOURCE: CSV SURVEY 2008

SOURCE: GMG FINANCE DEPARTMENT

Community expenditure 07/08

It is virtually impossible for GNM to split expenditure on community-related initiatives from our core business, as they are integral to so much of what we do - be it producing editorial content informing society about social justice issues or sponsoring conferences which raise profile and debate. We do however allocate specific funding for initiatives whose primary purpose is to benefit the communities that surround us

**INCLUDES MANAGEMENT AND ADMINISTRATION COSTS OF THE NEWSROOM ARCHIVE AND VISITOR CENTRE, GUARDIAN FOUNDATION, SCOTT TRUST CHARITABLE FUND AND BURSARIES.

Benefits that GNM volunteers feel they have gained

A sense of doing somethingworthwhile

It's enjoyable

Developing a relationship withthe children

New experiences and perspectives 79%

89%

89%

95%

58%Deeper understanding of socialissues in the community

£190,043GNM charitable giving

£154,963GNM charitableproject management*

£89,296Other GMG divisionscharitable giving

£855,015GNM Scott Trust

Foundation**

£1,289,317Total

*INCLUDES ADMINISTRATION, VOLUNTEER TRAINING, STAFF TIME, IMPACT EVALUATION, TRAVEL, PROJECT DOCUMENTATION & FUNDRAISING MATERIALS

Payroll giving and fundraising

While GNM supports various charities that fit with the company’s values or editorial themes, our award-winning payroll giving and match-funding schemes give staff the option to choose their own charitable organisations to support. As well as matching employees’ fundraising efforts pound for pound for the first £100 raised, we also incentivise staff to sign up to payroll giving. Around a third of our workforce currently donate to over 200 charities, which compares with a national average of just 4% according to a recent YouGov/Oxfam poll. As a result, charities have received over half a million pounds in the past five years.

We will not live in a bubble at Kings Place and ignore what is going on around us

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CommunitiesKing’s Cross

The main criteria for our community partners is that they are local to our offices in King’s Cross and Clerkenwell. In addition, we aim to work with groups involved in media education, those tackling social exclusion, and also with environmental projects which engage staff in our vision to become environmentally regenerative.

Media educationWe have launched a partnership with Pentonville Prison, supporting prisoners and teaching staff to develop a media centre as part of their education programme. Initially we are working with prisoners to improve their publication “Voice of the Ville”, with the longer-term aim of expanding the project to multimedia platforms.

One of the founding members explains how Voice of the Ville came about: “I had been here for a year and a half and thought to myself: there’s nothing here for us to express ourselves, so I wanted to do something about it. I approached the education department and they quickly gave assent. The first issue raised a few eyebrows and censorship was introduced, but gradually trust has been regained. I feel we will leave a worthwhile legacy to continue.”

So far, seven journalists and photographers, including our prisons correspondent, Eric Allison, and editor in chief Alan Rusbridger, have run workshops on subjects ranging from interview skills to picture editing. We have also donated eight computers and design software to support the group’s learning.

We are continuing our successful partnership with Live, a magazine written and produced by young people for their peers. Journalists and designers mentor Live’s contributors on individual features, as well as contributing to Live’s Talk Tuesday sessions where industry professionals describe their work and experiences and offer advice to the young people.

In addition, the Guardian and Observer have hosted six young people on work placements. Live’s education manager, Emma Warren, says: “All of them have come back with new insight, skills and contacts. It’s a brilliant, valuable and genuinely positive partnership that has massive impact on our contributors, both immediately and longer-term as they move into their careers”.

Local community partners

As well as journalism skills we are able to offer charities free expertise on other media skills such as PR, marketing, web development and podcasting. We recently ran a media-matching event in partnership with the Media Trust to match the skills of professionals from across the media industry, with local grassroots charities who needed help in those areas.

Tackling exclusionGiven the level of disadvantage in the communities around King’s Cross, along with GNM’s commitment to diversity and inclusion, it makes sense that we partner with projects that provide opportunity to those at risk of social exclusion.

Traditionally our projects have had a youth focus, but this year we have teamed up with Age Concern Camden to support local older people and reduce isolation through befriending and group activity. So far 10 employees have taken up the challenge.

Another new community partner is New Horizons Youth Centre for young homeless people. We launched the partnership by co-hosting a fundraising evening of music featuring the Guardian Angels staff choir, Alan Rusbridger, Channel 4 newsreader Jon Snow and a performance from some of New Horizon’s youngsters. The evening raised over £2,000 for the charity. Following the board’s Seeing is Believing visit (see page 39), Guardian Media Group chief executive, Carolyn McCall is also advising them on the development of a corporate fundraising board.

We are continuing our long-term relationships with three local schools: EGA language college, Winton primary and Richard Cloudesley special school. All of these have extremely ethnically diverse populations and a high proportion of students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Students at Richard Cloudesley also have physical and /or learning disabilities. Our main input at these schools continues to be our successful volunteering scheme which involves more than 40 employees regularly supporting reading, music, art and technology.

EnvironmentAnother new focus in King’s Cross has been environmental projects. These represent a tangible way to bring to life our vision to become environmentally regenerative, by engaging both staff and local people in the issues.

We have become a corporate partner of Camley Street Natural Park, a community-led conservation space just around the corner from our new offices. GNM donates £5,000 annually and sends in teams of volunteers to help with conservation and the park’s upkeep.

One volunteer wrote: “It is important for the Guardian to run this type of project to build up links with local organisations that reflect issues and ways of working relevant to the Guardian, such as the sustainability vision. It really helps to demonstrate the wish to make this a core working practice and also an ideal to live by.”

GNM has also provided £2,000 funding for the Thornhill Community Bridge Gardens project. This paid for a series of art workshops with local youth group Prospex, aimed at redesigning and renovating the bridge across the Regent’s canal, just north of our offices. This project forms part of the larger regeneration of the green areas along the canal which have traditionally attracted crime and antisocial behaviour.

We are continuing our long-term relationships with three local schools

Case study

%

SOURCE: GNM EMPLOYEE SURVEY 2008

GNM offers me the opportunity to getinvolved with local schools and charities

Agree

76

Disagree

5Not sure

19

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Partnering with Age Concern Camden

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CommunitiesScott Trust Foundation

Scott Trust FoundationThe Scott Trust Foundation is the umbrella organisation for charitable activities taking place under the direction of our owner, the Scott Trust. Its remit reflects one of the trust’s key objectives of “promoting the causes of freedom of the press and liberal journalism both in Britain and elsewhere”. It has three separate arms: the Guardian Foundation, the Newsroom visitor and archive centre, and the Scott Trust Charitable Fund. The Scott Trust Foundation also funds 10 internships and bursaries for aspiring journalists each year (see page 27). More information about the foundation can be found at gmgplc.co.uk/scotttrust

Guardian Foundation The Guardian Foundation is the Scott Trust’s overseas training arm, supporting the creation and running of editorially independent newspapers. In the past year it has worked with journalists and news organisations from Syria, Egypt, South Africa, China, Bulgaria and the Balkans.

The foundation isn’t a conventional training organisation. It doesn’t lecture students. Rather, it tries to bring together news professionals from the Guardian Media Group with their opposite numbers from newspapers all over the world — in seminars or on visits — so that they can learn from each other’s experience.

As well as supporting specific newspapers, the foundation sometimes helps a whole sector of journalism. For instance, after two visits to Damascus by the Guardian’s Steve Bell, we were able to put together an exhibition of Middle East cartooning (in association with the British Council) and show it in the Guardian Newsroom last summer.

In China, a new relationship has been formed with the journalism department at Wuhan University, where the Guardian’s east Asia correspondent Jonathan Watts has been lecturing on environmental reporting, as well as paving the way for future collaboration.

The foundation has been working in Slovenia for more than a decade and in 2008 executive editor Jo Confino and former readers’ editor Ian Mayes spent two days with key editors and media business owners there to look at how our work on sustainability and transparency could be replicated.

Education and archive centre Our education centre operates a range of activities that cater for up to 10,000 visitors a year. In term time, daily visiting school groups learn how to make a newspaper front page or build a website in a purpose-built education centre which mimics the workings

of the actual newsroom. Other activities include Q&As with journalists for university students, adult learner days, exhibition workshops and teacher conferences. Notable events in the past year have included the annual Big Draw event and teacher conferences on raising boys’ achievement.

The educational department is extending its activities to include projects with local community groups and arts organisations. GNM also operates a free exhibition space with a constantly changing programme. The Scott Trust Foundation also maintains and preserves an extensive archive relating to the histories of the Guardian, the Observer and guardian.co.uk. As well as official papers, the archive actively acquires material from people who have been associated with the papers and our collections include correspondence, diaries, original artwork

Feedback from community members this year was overwhelmingly positive

and photographs. More information at guardian.co.uk/newsroom

Scott Trust Charitable FundThe Scott Trust Charitable Fund supports projects associated with independent journalism, journalist ethics, media literacy and journalist training, both in the UK and abroad. Last year donations totalled £54,000.

It funds organisations such as the Media Trust, which links charities with media professionals to support their communications needs, and Pavement magazine for homeless people in the UK.

Two new beneficiaries were the Anthony Sampson Foundation, which creates opportunities for young disadvantaged journalists in South Africa, and Women in Media, which is cataloguing the records of Catherine Mary Stott, the first and longest serving editor of the Guardian women’s page.

The trust also covered the costs of bringing law students from Zimbabwe and Sierra Leone to the UK to participate in an international media law competition, organised by Oxford University centre for socio-legal studies. The purpose of the event was to promote media defence work and raise awareness of international standards of press freedom.

Charity begins at home...The Scott Trust is committed to promoting freedom of the press and spreading its liberal message, through a range of charitable activities

Last year’s Big Draw event Photo: David Levene

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Auditors’ reportThe findings

SustainabilityWe have remarked in previous audits on the speed with which GNM seems able to move when it understands change is≈necessary. The staff survey shows that the majority (82%) of all employees across the organisation say they understand why GNM is restructuring the business. That helps, especially when “change” means changing the nature of many people’s jobs, making redundancies and expecting everyone to take on a new “philosophy” — sustainability — as a core part of their job content and responsibilities.

The report fairly demonstrates, we believe, GNM’s leadership in coverage, quality and quantity of journalistic investment in sustainability in its press and web publications. The web-based initiatives launched in the last year and its pioneering work in developing sustainable solutions for advertisers, sponsors and conference organisers have translated the 2007 sustainability vision

into the core business activities of 2008 and beyond. Readers too, in the reader survey, acknowledge that GNM’s coverage of sustainability issues has led them to change their behaviour.

The company aims to be carbon positive and its wider vision of sustainability is central to its management of paper sourcing, printing, and procurement, including electricity, and in the fit-out of its new offices at Kings Place. This latter has been registered with the Considerate Constructors Scheme. With an independent audit score of 37/40 the fit-out is one of the most environmentally sensitive ever and represents best practice and a model for other companies to follow.

Environmental managementWhile future-proofing new developments is exemplary, dealing with a legacy of weak environmental management is patchy. Progress has been made with the print works, now fully under GNM control, and

aspects of office management. We applaud the work of the new

environmental manager in getting to grips in the past few months since her appointment with data management. However our auditor noted: “The environmental policy has not been formally reviewed for over a year and the relationship between the sustainability work in GNM and the environmental policy is not clear. GNM has prioritised the need for new environmental polices and procedures and for embedding environmental issues into strategic management processes. We therefore anticipate substantial improvements by the time of the next report.”

StaffWe welcome the responses management has made to address staff concerns raised in the staff survey. Following the results, a number of actions have been taken to deal with the four major areas: appraisals, career progression, pay reviews, and

Independent analysisRichard Evans and Allen Creedy from independent auditors ethics etc... provide their commentary on this year’s report

‘On the basis of the work we have done, we believe that GNM’s 2008 Living Our Values report satisfies the principal tests of materiality, completeness and responsiveness and gives an honest, reliable and balanced view of the company’s performance’

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Auditors’ reportThe findings

recruitment. Regular communications have been initiated to provide more information and news about green initiatives and how staff can be involved.

The restructuring of the business led to a large number of redundancies in some more traditional areas of the business. We were impressed with the way GNM and the outplacement agency it contracted has dealt with these and the evidence of positive outcomes for the majority of staff affected. We also welcome the inclusion in the report of a robust commentary on the change process by the leaders of

and comments and debate encouraged and heard.

Last year we recommended: “GNM should consider submitting its community involvement programme to the London Benchmarking Group so that its work can be compared with other businesses and particularly those in the news media sector.” A review of the whole GNM/Scott Trust community programme is underway including consideration of how benchmarking can add value.

Stakeholder engagementWe believe the levels of engagement with staff, readers, customers (advertisers) and with suppliers, through new procurement specs, are good. We have also noted how the company has responded energetically to its stakeholders’ interests and concerns. We would welcome some form of survey to test the quality of relationships and influence the company has with its customers and suppliers.

the two trades’ union chapels.We also welcome the favourable findings

of an equal pay audit which was carried out during the year.

For the fourth year in a row, GNM has failed to meet its targets on appraisals, despite being repeatedly criticised by the auditors. Among other efforts to address staff concerns about inconsistent feedback on performance and career development, we welcome the monthly reporting of progress on appraisals by department at board meetings and on the internal staff website.

Community involvementAcross the company and the Scott Trust the range of community involvement in the locality, prisons and schools and in supporting the development of liberal journalism in eastern Europe, Arab states and elsewhere is impressive. We particularly applaud the Katine Project website and the transparency with which the project is being managed,

We are all familiar with the practice of auditing company accounts. Shareholders appoint an independent auditor to give them assurance that the managers’ reports and accounts can be trusted. This helps investors, bankers and other stakeholders make informed decisions about their continued involvement and assess the risks and opportunities on the basis of complete and relevant information about the organisation’s financial performance and prospects.

For sustainability reports and corporate social responsibility reporting, international bodies like GRI (Global Reporting Initiative), Accountability and ACCA (Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) agree that independent auditing represents the highest level of transparency.

Guardian News and Media deserves recognition for implementing independent auditing from their first Living Our Values report in 2003.

What has ethics etc… done to provide this assurance?We have systematically tested the claims made in this report and checked the data and the management systems and controls that produce it. We have reviewed stakeholder surveys — both readers and staff — and several reports by external consultants and auditors. We have also interviewed the senior and middle managers we considered relevant to our investigation. In all our work we have applied the three principle tests set out in AccountAbility’s AA1000AS Assurance Standard. These are:Materiality Is the information relevant to stakeholders’ concerns and interests and will it help

them make informed judgments about the company’s performance? Completeness Does the information provide sufficient evidence that the company understands all its significant social, economic and environmental impacts?Responsiveness Does the report demonstrate the company’s responses and commitment to improving its performance?

What does independence mean?Apart from being paid by GNM to carry out this audit, ethics etc… and its auditors have no other relationships with GNM or other Guardian Media Group companies or with any of their stakeholders.

We are not responsible for any of the content of the report or for its design, and we have not carried out any consultancy work with GNM. The content of the report and the design and control of the systems that produce the data it contains are the responsibility of the directors of GNM.

We see our primary responsibility as providing assurance to GNM’s readers, staff, suppliers, customers and community partners that the report covers all significant activities and impacts and that its claims about performance can be trusted.

The assurance assignment was carried out by social auditors Richard Evans and Allen Creedy, who have looked in detail at the technical and operational aspects of GNM’s environmental processes and performance. For details of their qualifications and experience visit ethicset.co.uk

Why does GNM submit its reports to an independent auditor?

We welcome the responses management has made to address staff concerns

Teri Pengilley